We’ve all got questions. It’s human nature to look around us at the world and the people in it and want to know more – and some of us even get up the nerve to ask those questions, too.
It can be frustrating, then, to ask more than once, to people who should have good answers, and get nothing satisfying in return. That’s exactly the experience of these 17 people, though, so prepare to put on your thinking cap.
17. Hmmm.
Why does my stainless steel razor get blunted by some hair stubble on my throat with only 1 minute of use ?
Answer?
A good cutting edge is thin, very very thin, and commensurately weak and prone to bending.
In the same way that your weak organic flesh can bend a metal spoon that is objectively harder than you are (because the metal is thin), the nanometer-thin cutting edge of a razor can be bent by hairs.
Once burrs and nicks have built up on a blade edge it becomes much less efficient at cutting, as the lead edge that pared objects apart is now, say, 3-10x wider than before and takes that much more effort to make the cut.
This won’t literally happen in a minute of use, but it will happen over time.
A secondary effect for a razor is you can get gunk stuck on the blade, but rinsing it off should restore function.
16. Like, when does it stop mattering socially or medically?
How many generations does it take to disregard incest?
We are all related distantly so how many? Like 5? 8?
15. Good to know…
What happens if you donate your hair to someone and they commit a crime, leaving your hair at the crime scene?
Answer?
When hair is used in DNA testing, they aren’t actually using the hair, but the small follicle of skin at the root of the hair. When donating hair, they cut the hair off, not extracting the root of the hair. No root, no DNA to collect.
14. There have been some answers forthcoming…
Why are dreams so weird?
Answer?
Basically, dreaming is your brain defragmenting factual memories (things that happened and thoughts you had) for long term storage, dealing with emotions/emotional memory, and also random brain activation. Mix those three aspects together and that’s why they’re so weird.
13. Of course they did.
If a Tesla’s autopilot makes sure you’re not too close to something, would it help you avoid a cop car that’s trying to pit you?
Asked this in r/Tesla and got shamed for not owning a Tesla but it was never answered.
Answer?
I think the most likely outcome based on my experience with FSD is your car slamming hard on the brakes to emergency stop if the cop car pulls in front of you, at which point it won’t speed up to get away.
If you were just on the highway and a cop was tailing you it’d just keep driving though. If you have any other questions I’m happy to answer.
12. Some deep thoughts.
Why does plastic turn white when you bend it?
What is actually happening at the molecular level up until the break, do different polymers and their associated dyes still turn white?
11. Leaving this one without comment.
Growing up in a Southern, Evangelical church the official rule was absolutely no drinking.
I asked “Why? Jesus drank wine regularly in the Bible?” I was told well “So many people have trouble with alcohol. Even if you can drink in moderation without sinning someone who can’t may be encouraged to drink by seeing you drink.”
Sort of made sense on its face until I thought for 3 seconds. There were a lot of large people in our church. So I asked, “gluttony is a sin though, right?” Them: “Yes.” Me: “So why do we serve donuts before church if it might tempt someone struggling with gluttony?”
Never got an answer other than vague comments about it being different for reasons.
10. Who decided? I would like a word.
Why are swear/cuss/bad words bad?
How did it become that way and who made them bad?
9. This one cracked me up.
What do DJs actually do? When you watch a video of them “playing” their turntables they do all sorts of stuff, turning knobs, pressing buttons, moving sliders up and down, etc.
It all looks very showy but as far as I can tell none of it has any discernable effect on the music. Like they’ll grab some random knob and turn it and start dancing like that was some really sick s*%t, but absolutely nothing happened to the beat, timbre, pitch, melody, etc.
8. I wish stylists would have more input, but they’ve probably been burned too many times.
how to get a good haircut? People always just say “oh, bring in a picture of what you want.” But I don’t fucking know what’s going to be good.
And when I have chosen something from the first google image page of “hairstyles for men,” it never comes out looking even close to the picture
7. The far reaches of space.
If gravity bends light, how do we know anything in the far reaches of the universe is actually located where we think it is?
Answer?
The other answer is basically correct, because we can calculate that bending. If we can determine the mass of an object we can now determine how it bends light, and thus calculate real positions. These kinds of observations can be incredibly difficult, requiring observations from many telescopes and insane levels of precision, but essentially by just working our way out into space we can calculate details of further objects and use our earlier observations to support those calculations.
Also, it should be noted that space is INSANELY empty, so many observations, even of objects really far away, dont involve any meaningful gravitational distortions.
6. Whatever you can.
What do you do if you’re stuck at a red light and theres an EMV with sirens on behind you?
5. Can someone just call it in?
What does the US National debt really mean? Who do we owe? What is the impact of the debt? What risks does it impose?
Answer?
As far as I know, we mostly own money to ourselves. The way it was explained to me is that the US takes the money in the banks and uses that, but they have to pay it back. So they are constantly in debt to US citizens. Here is a link that shows the debt and where it is to/from.
4. Could it be…?
why are my hands constantly cold.
half of the comments say that i have bad posture and/or have another problem, and the other half say that i have a disease so irk of i should be worried.
I have a family member who always has cold hands and feet – they have Raynaud’s syndrome. It’s a (usually) not-serious condition that means the blood doesn’t flow properly to their extremities, resulting in coldness.
3. Check your sponge.
Why clean dishes/glasses acquire an abhorrent smell sometimes, especially in summer if a window is open… weirder still, not everyone seems to be able to smell it.
2. Don’t they just get it started?
are symphony conductors really necessary? They wave their arms around and the little stick, but none of the musicians are even looking at them.
As someone who’s played in a professional orchestra…yes, a skilled orchestra can play without a conductor. In fact, when the “orchestra” first became a thing, they didn’t have conductors to begin with. The “concertmaster” (first chair violinist) would start and stop the group.
In my group our conductor will actually sometimes stop conducting during rehearsal and just go out into the audience and listen, lol. However when we play without a conductor, the chance of errors and sections getting out of sync is much higher, because we’re relying solely on our ears to tell us if we’re playing in time.
And in an orchestra, there’s a LOT of different parts that have to sync up, a lot of different stuff you have to listen to. If we do start to fall apart when we’re playing without a conductor, it’s almost impossible to get back together.
1. The answer is different for everyone.
How do I fall asleep easily? It takes me an hour to fall asleep.
One answer?
This works in minutes for me: play some chill music on your phone at low volume and put it about a foot away. I like stuff like Football Head by Flamingosis and similar stuff. I think the genre is called Lofi. Imagine you can fly just by opening your arms.
Imagine taking a tour of your neighborhood or city from the air or flying over your friends houses and over places you know of. Imagine as much detail as you can. I fall asleep in like 5 minutes tops.
I feel like now I need answers to these questions, too.
Do you have a question to put on this list? Share it with us in the comments!
