11. Can plants become “overweight” if they produce too much food in a similar fashion to how animals gain weight if they eat too much food?
“Plants can get overloaded with fruits. In a year with plenty of water and sunshine, they can produce so many fruits that weigh itself down, which end up bending or snapping their branches.
Other plants can grow too big for their environments. A side branch growing towards sunshine may overextend and can break when stressed in wind or when covered with snow.” –PrionBacon
12. Why does Pepsi in a can taste different from Pepsi in a glass or plastic?
“The aluminum cans have a polymer lining that can absorb some of the soda’s flavors, potentially making the taste milder. If you are slugging your soda from a plastic bottle, the soda’s flavor may be altered by some of the acetaldehyde in the plastic transferring into the drink.
Since glass bottles are basically inert, they’ll deliver a product very close to the original intent. The metal taste some people note from soda in cans may have more to do with their sensitivity to metal—they’re tasting the can as they put it to their lips, not a metallic taste that’s actually present in the cola.” –ammon-jerro
13. How does a calculator know and use pi if even super computers can’t know all the digits. Does it use like first 100 digits?
“Probably way less than that. For any real-world application, even a few decimal places are totally sufficient. Use 6 digits, and the circumference of a kilometer-wide circle is less than a centimeter off the true value. That’s already better than most measurement methods. And additionally to that, computers in general can’t handle infinitely precise numbers.
If you do the right calculations, the error could stack up, but in this case you rather use mathematical tricks to simplify the calculations first, before using any hard-coded numbers.” –AtomKanister
14. Why is spoiled food dangerous if our stomach acid can basically dissolve almost anything organic?
“Not all bacteria go down to the stomach, some stay in your mouth.
Bacteria can also produce toxins on the food while it spoils, even if the stomach acid kills the bacteria, the toxins can still poison you.
Also some bacteria are just acid resistant.” –PanikLIji
15. Why can’t you boil a sponge to sanitize it?
“Boiling or microwaving will KILL the bacteria. What it won’t do is REMOVE the dead bacteria. That means there is dead biological material that’s just food for more bacteria. The more you sanitize the sponge, the faster more new bacteria will grow…” –TheGuyOnTop
16. Why do sunsets and sunrises look so different? Isn’t it technically the same thing?
“The air is typically warmer in the evening than it is in the morning, which can affect how moisture and dust are suspended in the air, which affects what we see.” –AStormofSwines
17. What is the “Event Horizon”?
“The closer you get to the centre of a black hole, the stronger it pulls, and the faster you need to move to escape that pull.
At some point the speed you need to escape its pull becomes greater than the speed of light. Because speed of light is the fastest speed anything can move with, nothing can escape it. This point is what’s called event horizon.” –fuckmeinthesoul
18. If ants love sugar, and bees make honey, why aren’t bee hives constantly attacked by ants?
“In some southern states beekeepers will actually put the leg stands of some raised hives in containers of water to prevent small insects that will rob a weakened hive. In theory the water will prevent small insects from reaching the stand legs and crawling up into the hive.” –Zrock1013
19. Why can your body have a “sleep debt” but not a “sleep surplus”?
“Your brain is like a trash can. Throughout the day it fills up with garbage, and at night that garbage is slowly removed. If you don’t get enough sleep, only some of the garbage gets taken out. Over time, it builds up until your can is almost always full. A full can is bad and makes you fall asleep or hallucinate.
However if you sleep lots and lots, your trash-can can’t get under 0% full. It will always only hold a certain amount of garbage.” –adp1314
20. How does an enclosed environment like a bird’s egg support a growing animal compared to a mammalian womb? How are waste products removed, are there hormones involved, and how does the embryo receive oxygen?
“Egg has two layers. When egg cools after being laid, the inside layer shrinks a bit, making an air pocket.
Egg has garbage sack called an allantois. Garbage sack does gas exchange through the air pocket and tiny holes in egg surface. Garbage sack holds liquid waste.” –tepidbathwater
21. Why do you feel more tired when sunburnt?
“‘Sunburn’ is another name for “nuclear radiation damage to millions of cells across a wide area of the body”.
There is a flurry of activity by DNA-repair enzymes and other repair processes.
Those cells with irreparable damage sense it and commit mass cell-suicide to avoid becoming cancer. Their “bodies” then need to be swept up and taken away.
All together, that is a massive drain on your immune system and body energy stores. And at the same time, being sunburnt probably means you were outside a long time – which means you’re likely dehydrated and maybe muscle fatigued from hiking, swimming etc. Add all that to the radiation damage and it’s no wonder you’re wiped.” –BurnOutBrighter6
22. What are flies doing when it looks like they are rubbing their hands?
“Cleaning their sensory hairs.
Most insects have some kind of grooming habit like this for their forelimbs and face.” –Fhtagnyatta
23. Why do we primarily use table salt (NaCl) in food? Are there no other crystalline compounds that may also taste good?
“A lot of things we eat will form orderly crystals if you purify them and then allow them to condense. Sugar crystals are probably the most common of the bunch.
If you’re asking specifically about ionic compounds, the relative abundance of sodium chloride on Earth has led to these ions both being incorporated into our biochemistry. You need salt, and have evolved to like the taste – within reason.
There are other ions that we process out of our food too, but most of them don’t taste great on their own. We’re specifically drawn to sodium chloride because it’s difficult to find on land – saltwater fish aren’t nearly as interested in salty food.” –Lithuim
h/t Reddit: r/explainlikeimfive