History
Exploring "Why" questions about History
491 articles
Why were the Aztec, Mayans, etc wiped out by the diseases carried by the Europeans and not vice versa?
There were many settlers who died of disease. The thing is that the travel back to Europe was long enough that most lethal diseases would kill their victims before they could get back to Europe. Europ
Why do people drive by accelerating and then braking, instead of maintaining a more constant speed and deceleration naturally?
Your instructor is correct. That is the right way to drive, and is a lot more efficient and kinder on your car. But maintaining a constant speed is a challenging skill you have to learn, and not every
Why do people black out when drinking?
Well, quite simply put alcohol is poison, and as such it has some negative effects on your body. To be spesific, there is a part of your brain called the hippocampus, that is the part of the brain tha
Why is someone recording themselves talking about a murder they committed a confession, but at the same time rappers and others in the music culture talk about murder and drug use constantly in the…
Bobby Shmurda actually gave info towards crime and gang related activity police were looking into in his music and it was used to help build a case lol. So it’s not necessarily without any consequence
Why do film clips from World War I look so sped up?
[There've been other threads that explain this well](_URL_0_), but I'll summarize: Basically, it's because of the difference in frames per second (fps) between old and new filming. Older films have a
Why do we glorify conquerors like Genghis Khan and vilify the likes of Adolf Hitler?
Genghis Khan won. Hitler lost. Also, time.
why is mocking the Jewish faith so common in popular entertainment?
I just wanted to point out that Matt Stone is Jewish and that South Park rips every religion a new asshole, not just Judaism. They also wrote a massively successful musical called "The Book of Mormon"
Why is it when we look over to a blinking object the first blink seems to take a lot longer?
This phenomenon is more commonly noticed with clocks, and goes by the name of chronostasis. What's happening is your brain decides that what you're seeing while your eyes move over to the blinker is t
Why is Russia attacking ISIS a bad thing? Why are not more countries fighting it?
Russia has captured the moral high ground in framing their activities as "attacking ISIS," but its real interests are stabilizing Syria with Assad remaining in power. Likewise, the US and its allies i
Why do some TV shows like TBBT and Homeland make it over to prime time British TV, but Parks and Recreation and Breaking Bad don’t?
Either the networks there believe that they will not be popular enough to justify acquiring the rights to, or the rights holders in the US are asking for more money than the British networks are willi