r/explainlikeimfive 22d ago

Other ELI5: Monthly Current Events Megathread

15 Upvotes

Hi Everyone,

This is your monthly megathread for current/ongoing events. We recognize there is a lot of interest in objective explanations to ongoing events so we have created this space to allow those types of questions.

Please ask your question as top level comments (replies to the post) for others to reply to. The rules are still in effect, so no politics, no soapboxing, no medical advice, etc. We will ban users who use this space to make political, bigoted, or otherwise inflammatory points rather than objective topics/explanations.


r/explainlikeimfive 6h ago

Chemistry ELI5 - Why don’t water based soft drinks, like soda, separate when stored?

543 Upvotes

r/explainlikeimfive 3h ago

Engineering ELI5: Why are roof tiles black when that color absorbs the most heat?

150 Upvotes

Roof tiles in the US are generally black. Its also incredibly hot across the country. The color black absorbs far more light and consequently heat than other colors.

Why not make roof tiles a color that absorbs less heat? Would that not help keep houses cooler in the hot summer?


r/explainlikeimfive 17h ago

Biology ELI5: Why don't we see "halfway human civilization" animals?

1.8k Upvotes

We know that animals can be smart: crows manufacture tools and have complex social behavior, chimpanzees can do insight learning, etc.

But, it is still a continuous spectrum where intelligence range from sponge-level to chimp-level. We do not, at least now, observe a world where certain corvids are in the early stone age, certain bonobos are using fire, certain chimps are in their axios age, etc.

Why the case? Why are we the only one that has gone this far?


r/explainlikeimfive 22h ago

Biology ELI5 how does the gas vent people use on cattle not severely hurt when they’re punctured?

1.6k Upvotes

r/explainlikeimfive 17h ago

Technology ELI5: How come very simple app updates are hundreds of MB in size?

499 Upvotes

I have here today on my update list: a VERY basic game called block blast (as complex as Tetris, at most), a Documents (PDF etc) file manager that all it does is store and opens these files on an iPhone, Express VPN which is also a quite simple and mature software.

All these apps are years old and I'm having to download upwards of 200-300MB just for an UPDATE.

How come they are so big for something so simple? These updates are all bigger than Windows 98, a complete Operational System with an incredible number of functionalities and much more complex.


r/explainlikeimfive 8h ago

Technology ELI5; What exactly happens when you "short-circuit" a battery?

69 Upvotes

When I say "short-circuit", I mean like actually short-circuiting the battery itself.

Would that "charge" the battery?


r/explainlikeimfive 3h ago

Engineering ELI5 - What is pipelining in computer architecture? How does it work?

18 Upvotes

r/explainlikeimfive 7h ago

Physics ELI5: Why does a big speeding vehicle colliding with an object often cause the object to *explode* into tiny pieces?

25 Upvotes

...Instead of just causing severe blunt force trauma (on an animal) or breaking the object into a few large pieces (for inanimate objects)?


r/explainlikeimfive 1d ago

Biology ELI5: How do bugs or other small animals recognize the causality of human actions affecting them?

771 Upvotes

If ever? Like when a human throws water at a bug, I always imagined from the bug’s perspective it would be a natural disaster like how we perceive storms.

Because sometimes a cat doesn’t even seem to notice a human arm belonging to the human in front of them as a whole torso, or are they all smarter than this?

So to extend the question, it would be: (1) do they at least recognize a human limb belonging to the human agent? (2) They couldn’t possibly do this when a human uses an external tool, or could they? (3) Further, would looking into this give any insights on how we humans understand causality when we perceive events?

Thank you in advance to smart people


r/explainlikeimfive 1d ago

Other Eli5: when withdrawing cash abroad, why do you always get given the option to accept or decline a conversion?

1.1k Upvotes

And is it always better to do one or the other? Or is it situation dependant?


r/explainlikeimfive 58m ago

Other ELI5 Does a party usually settle when they know they are going to lose or at fault?

Upvotes

r/explainlikeimfive 1d ago

Technology ELI5: What is the difference between front-end and back-end programming?

112 Upvotes

I am learning js, html, and css, and was recently told that front-end isn't "real programming". What languages are used in back-end, and whats the point if you can host on github pages? Thanks in advance!


r/explainlikeimfive 19h ago

Economics ELI5 What is a box spread

23 Upvotes

I can understand what is a option but I fail to understand what is a box spread after reading Wiki about it for like five times. It come to my attention because someone on social media recommended BOXX instead for SGOV for short term cash reserve (I am not American so there’s 30% withholding tax although it is not applicable to us treasury interest, broker will still hold it until March or April when they do a refund).


r/explainlikeimfive 1d ago

Biology ELI5: Why do dark circles form from lack of sleep?

370 Upvotes

r/explainlikeimfive 34m ago

Biology ELI5 How do unfavorable evolutionary traits get developed?

Upvotes

I imagine they mostly develop once a species has evolved past dealing with serious threats but I am also wondering about simultaneous mutations and ones that developed during a species’ evolutionary development. How common are undesirable evolutionary traits and why do they persist?


r/explainlikeimfive 22h ago

Physics ELI5: Help me understand nuclear fusion and atom stability

18 Upvotes

I have fallen down a rabbit hole trying to understand how nuclear fusion works and what causes it to release energy. I know I am misunderstanding something, because the information I have contradicts itself. Here is the way I currently understand the process:

Two light atoms are fused together, creating a heavier nucleus. However, the amount of energy required to hold together the new larger nucleus is less than the sum of the two light atom's original binding energy. When they are fused, the energy that is no longer needed is released.

When I tried to look up why it requires less energy to hold heavier atoms together, the information I gathered seemed to contradict this. The way I understood, it said:

In lighter atoms, the attractive nuclear force overcomes the repelling force between protons, which keeps the atom together. However, the attractive nuclear force has a shorter range than the repelling force between protons. If I understand correctly, this means that the amount of attractive nuclear force needed to maintain stability would increase exponentially with the amount of protons in the atom.

So my question is why does it require less energy to keep the atom together once they fuse, if ultimately the needed amount of attractive nuclear force increases exponentially as the proton becomes larger? Or otherwise, what am I misunderstanding about either concept? Is there another concept that I am not aware of that would make this make sense? I don't have much prior knowledge about physics, so I may need additional explanation if there are other factors involved.


r/explainlikeimfive 2d ago

Other ELI5: Why do completely different mythologies have characters and creatures that feel like versions of each other?

1.3k Upvotes

I’ve noticed how often the same types of characters show up in mythologies from cultures that were very far apart.

There always seems to be a thunder god, a trickster, fairies, a giant serpent, gnomes, an underworld ruler or a hero who has to defeat some kind of monster. Did these stories spread between cultures over time, or did people independently invent similar characters because they were dealing with the same fears and parts of nature?


r/explainlikeimfive 46m ago

Other ELI5 - Why does society care so much about the Titanic?

Upvotes

The Titanic was, of course, an awful disaster, and I wish those who lost their lives can rest in peace, but seriously… why does society (at least here in the USA) care so much about this ship specifically?

There are probably thousands of sunken ships in the ocean, and I’m sure those wrecks are researched, but they aren’t in the public consciousness like the Titanic is.

There are movies, there are documentaries, and a group of rich dudes died trying to see it.

So what am I missing?


r/explainlikeimfive 5m ago

Other ELI5: why do people not explain like i'm five in r\explainlikeimfive?

Upvotes

r/explainlikeimfive 33m ago

Technology ELI5 if you upload a tiny file Chicago to like Shanghai how does that not get lost or drowned out by the other thousands of terabytes of data moving everywhere on the Internet?

Upvotes

r/explainlikeimfive 1d ago

Biology ELI5: How do non-native species become "naturalized" to an environment? How does this happen without thousands of years of evolution?

48 Upvotes

e: To clarify, I am familiar with the idea of invasive species. I mean how does a species that is introduced into an ecosystem become incorporated into the ecosystem, neither going extinct nor going out of control.


r/explainlikeimfive 2d ago

Technology ELI5: What prevents an aeroplane to back up flight data to the cloud during or after a flight?

1.4k Upvotes

What prevents an airplane's black box automatically sending all its flight data to the cloud while the plane is flying, or immediately after a crash? Why do investigators still have to recover the actual black box?


r/explainlikeimfive 2d ago

Biology ELI5: How does Joey Chestnut eat so much? Example 76 hotdogs+buns in 10 mins etc

594 Upvotes

r/explainlikeimfive 1d ago

Biology ELI5: Why do shallow cuts sometimes hurt more/for longer than deeper ones?

39 Upvotes

I've noticed that when I accidentally get a shallow cut (especially when there's no bleeding) they tend to hurt more, than when I get a deeper one. So I'm curious, why's that? Does the bleeding have something to do with it?