Science
Exploring "Why" questions about Science
484 articles
Why does an electric kettle make a lot of sound at first, which eventually dies off once the water starts to boil?
Cavitation. Basically, the heating element heats the water just above it. This causes that water to boil, forming a little bubble of gas.
Why are we asked to turn our phones and electronics off when taking off and landing a plane.
Well everyone here appears to be a moron. The reason your phone needs to be off is because the flight crew doesn't want you to be distracted in case of emergency when they may need to tell you importa
Why do white things turn yellow if they stay in light?
It's not that they're white, it's that they're made of a type of plastic that, after prolong exposure to light, will degrade, becoming yellowed and brittle. UV is bad for that type of plastic, so the
Why does the box say to make the oven hotter if I want a softer crust on my frozen pizza?
This is why you should read cooking instructions carefully. For the soft crust, the instructions will tell you to place it on a cookie sheet, thus avoiding direct heat. Usually, they either tell you t
why the waves don’t interfere?
For waves to interfere, i.e. cancel each other out or amplify each other, they have to have a very similar frequency, as in "almost the same". Imagine a lake.
Why would the U.S. Special Forces (supposedly) bury Bin Laden’s body at sea almost immediately after his death?
> If the story isn't entirely true, then what would be a probable alternative? Scuttlebutt I've read from conspiracy heads is that they don't think there was a SEAL team, but rather that bin Laden
Why does gas you get in the US have so much lower octane numers than in germany?
Your octane numbers and our octane numbers don't mean the same thing. From an engineering perspective the octane number is actually a kind of hilariously arbitrary number that basically boils down a b
Why do some games run on a mac but not on linux if both are unix based os.
They're not UNIX-*based*, they're UNIX-*like*. MacOS is based on FreeBSD, which i a very different operating system than Linux. Furthermore, MacOS has it's own *completely* custom GUI and graphics API
Why do scrapes and other injuries feel more painful when its cold outside?
When it's cold, your body draws blood in from the limbs to conserve its warmth by constricting the veins in those limbs. This causes the skin and flesh to press on the nerves, increasing their sensiti
Why does the last half of a tank of gas never last as long as the first half?
Most car's I've had don't accurately measure the "true" last half. The level sender measures depth only, but the shape of the tank changes. Also I've noticed that if you check the manual for the tank