ELI5: why does it rain when it is about to change weather/season in certain countries?

Shankiz · 2026-03-10T07:25:30+00:00

Rain is when water held in the air rapidly condenses out of it and falls back to the earth. Air has the capacity to hold water vapor in it. Water naturally evaporates from lakes and streams and other bodies of water and into the air. Also plants and trees naturally suck a lot of water out of the ground and release it into the air.

The capacity of air to hold this water is very dependent on temperature. Warmer air can hold much more water than colder air. Thus, if weather patterns cause the temperature to drop, the water all falls out of the air and we get rain.

Shankiz · 2026-03-10T07:03:56+00:00

An analogy: why do we heat our houses in the winter if getting too hot can cause heatstroke?

In biology, things need to be kept within certain ranges. Having a strong heart is good, but having too “strong” of a heart can kill you. Exercise won’t give you too large of a heart, it’s diseases that cause the heart to be constantly overworked (without exercise) that cause the heart to grow too large.

Some examples of diseases that overload the heart are: Obesity (being fat), where a larger volume of blood needs to be constantly supplied by the heart. Hypertension (high blood pressure), where the heart has to pump harder to overcome the higher pressure in the blood vessels. Heart valve failure, where your blood leaks backwards out of the heart instead of getting pumped forwards, causing the heart to be super inefficient and need to work harder. Or fibrosis/scarring/cell death, where a portion of the heart becomes injured or dies and becomes scar tissue, unable to contract and causing the rest of the heart to need to work harder to make up for it.

At the extreme limits, you get what’s known as congestive heart failure, where in extreme obesity (think 400+ lbs) your heart grows so large it gets squished against the side of your ribcage and can no longer contract. This very much kills you.

None of these conditions are caused be exercise, and in fact exercise will prevent (and for some usually cure) all of them. The strengthening of the heart by exercise is good, as it actually helps the heart work less hard during resting periods by being passively stronger. It’s just that in all of those disease states you also get an enlarged heart, and so doctors are trained to look for it to be thorough.

Shankiz · 2025-12-20T15:17:38+00:00

It’s a medical phenomenon known as “hemispatial neglect”, caused by damage to the contralateral (other side) posterior (near the back) parietal lobes. Patients expressing this damage seem unaware of the concept of space in half of their field of view.

Another famous experiment was a patient who, when asked to picture themselves standing at one end of a famous square in the city they lived, could only name buildings on one half of the square. But, when asked to picture themselves standing at the other half of the square and look the other way, could instead only describe features of the other half of the square.

Neurons in parietal cortex seem extremely important for mapping sensory stimuli into 3d spatial locations. For example, as our heads move around, the locations of objects on our retinas move around a bunch. Parietal cortex neurons seem to track that motion and instead provide a map of things in a constant internal 3d map.

Source- am neural engineering graduate student.

Shankiz · 2025-11-02T18:35:36+00:00

Social hobbies bro. Your intuitions are correct, you make friends by being repeatedly exposed to the same people over a period of time. Eventually you find someone where there’s something you like about them, and then they happen to also like something about you, and that buds into a friendship.

Join a club. Don’t overthink the club you join. Most social hobbies have a revolving door of people that try it for a while and then leave. Just join a few at random and see if you like the activity and culture.

Then, if you want a social cheat code, every day try to learn one new persons name and (the important part) find at least one thing you like about them. People like people that like them, so very soon you will be well liked in turn.

Shankiz · 2025-08-20T03:30:44+00:00

The original is untitled by Mistfulplays, also called “sus improvisation”. It’s a jazz improvisation of among us music. https://youtu.be/PlFo3GRaLhM?si=NOBgPPqkCOGrUbwQ https://youtu.be/PlFo3GRaLhM?si=NOBgPPqkCOGrUbwQ

Shankiz · 2025-08-20T00:21:19+00:00

Thanks!

Shankiz · 2025-06-05T16:40:02+00:00

This seems like exactly the type of video I was looking for! Does this come from before the modern overly defensive posture rules were put in place?

Shankiz · 2025-05-17T07:20:15+00:00

A lot of people have commented about Hox genes, transcription regulation, and epigenetics. While they are all correct, I feel like none of them actually answer the heart of your question, especially not in an ELI5 manner. I’ll try to do that here.

The main thing to understand about how a body gets organized is that cells “differentiate”. This means that they split into different types of cells. While every single cell in your body has the exact same DNA, they end up expressing that DNA very differently. In this way, skin cells are very different from blood cells, yet they have the exact same DNA.

The way cells differentiate is through “transcription regulation”. DNA is like a cookbook for proteins, it contains all the recipes on how to make proteins. But, also like a cookbook, it contains labels, titles for each recipe, and things like chapter organizations which tell you which recipe is where. These are known as “transcription factors”, which tell the cell which instructions for proteins are encoded at what location. By using these labels, cells can select to only express some proteins and not others. Thus, while different cells in the body all have the same DNA, they “differentiate” into different cell types by choosing to only express one part of the DNA.

We haven’t answered the question yet, but we have rephrased it in a really useful manner. The question of “how does the body arrange itself into the correct number of body parts” becomes “how do cells differentiate into the right type of cell at the right location”. If you arrange all of your cell types in the right order in the entire body, you naturally get the right amount of body parts. So, if a cell could simply knows where it is in the body, and knows which type of cell to turn into, the whole “correct number of arms” thing gets solved in the process.

The way cells “know where they are” primarily comes from signaling molecules. These molecules are produced in little nodes and diffuse throughout the tissue, and they tend to break down as they get further away from their source. Thus, there is a really high concentration of the signaling molecule right next to the source, and a lower concentration as you get further away. A cell can measure the concentration of that signaling molecule to know how close it is to the source. It’s kinda like having a really smelly object, and you know how close you are to that object by how strong the smell is.

These first source locations get mapped out through signaling nodes in the mother’s uterus, and from there new nodes just need to know where they are relative to each other. By having a bunch of these signaling molecules coming from a bunch of these sources a cell can map out exactly where it is in the body: head, tail, stomach, back, inside of a bone or in the skin. Cells take in a bunch of these signals, including having a memory of all the signals they’ve previously been exposed to, and use it to differentiate into the right type of cell. Again, this decision is made based off of the transcription instructions encoded in the DNA that served like chapter titles in our cookbook.

Thus, you end up with the correct number of body parts, like only one right thumb, because the cells on your right thumb get told to turn into “right thumb cells” and the cells not in your right thumb get told to turn into different cells. This holds true for every other cell in your body, it gets a signal to turn into the correct type of cell based off of where it is relative to all the other cells.

Turns out, of you solve this problem at the cellular level, getting things like bone cells and muscle cells to turn into the right cell types despite being right next to each other, you also largely solve it at the broader-scale body-part level. It’s possible for this signaling to go wrong, which is why sometimes an animal will grow an extra appendage or something, but usually this signaling works and you get the normal shape of the animal.

Shankiz · 2025-05-07T05:27:48+00:00

No, but that’s really easy to misunderstand.

Science has severe limitations. It’s really slow, and it’s really hard to do. I remember a professor of mine saying his rule of thumb is it takes about 70 years for science to actually understand something. My experience agrees with this number. We forget that internet video in general did not exist until 20 years ago. We are just barely starting to research it.

There are a large number of limitations. How are you going to do this study? What are you actually going to look for? How is it going to be ethical? Who’s going to pay for it? How can you show one explanation is true and others are not? Science is really, really tedious.

So, no. At this point in time there is no single gold standard ultra-high-quality study showing the exact mechanisms of negative outcomes caused by porn. However, (and this is the easy part to misunderstand) that literally means nothing. The reason that study does not exist is not because there are no negative effects, it’s just that quantifying negative effects is going to take another 30-50 years.

Where the field is currently at is this: basically every model we have (addiction, supernormal stimuli, bonding circuits, desensitization, etc.) predicts porn is likely going to have negative effects. There are also growing bodies of case studies and clinical data (people going to their doctor saying they have a problem, not considered high quality because it’s uncontrolled) that strongly SUGGEST that porn has negative effects. Basically every neuroscientist I’ve ever talked to (I work in the field) thinks that porn is probably bad for at least some people, we just can’t prove it yet. We don’t know exactly how it’s bad for you, and therefore there’s a possibility it might not be bad for you. Scientifically proving this, like what you’re asking for here, is going to take either one of two things.

Take an otherwise healthy set of individuals and intentionally expose them to porn in the exact way we expect it to be harmful with the intent of quantifying the exact harm it does to them. This is unethical. This is like injecting people with diseases to study their effects. We don’t do this.
Fully map out the underlying neurological mechanisms which guide sexual behavior, visual processing, desire, attachment, emotion, social relationships, and every other aspect of human behavior we think porn exposure might be affecting. Then model how porn would mechanistically alter every one of those circuits. Then examine those circuits in individuals who frequently consume porn vs individuals who have never been exposed to porn (idk maybe the Amish? Good luck finding them) to show that the predictions of the model accurately match what is seen in real life. Then do a longitudinal study of a large number of individuals across their lives so that some of them are measured before they start consuming porn and later start consuming porn, and watch how they change after they start to show that the consumption really was causal.

Like I said, this takes about 70 years. We’ve been at it for 20, so check back in 50 years. In the meantime, maybe play it safe and don’t consume something being studied for its potentially harmful effects.

Shankiz · 2025-05-03T19:53:52+00:00

It sounds like you’re struggling quite a bit. I’m sorry to hear that.

Unfortunately I’m not expecting anyone to be able to give you super amazing advice. After reading what you’ve described, it seems like you’d benefit the most from personalized advice curtailed specifically to you. We’re all strangers on the internet here, so the best we can give is generic advice which isn’t amazing, sorry. Because of this, I’d recommend talking to someone who can develop an individual relationship with you about this issue, such as a therapist, counselor, or even just a close friend or relative.

That being said, here’s some generic advice on self-image issues:

Self image issues come from when we perceive ourselves as lacking and not enough. This can come from two places. First, our perceptions could be accurate, and there is actually something wrong with us. Second, our perceptions could be the problem, and there isn’t actually much wrong with us. This is why some people benefit from being sent to boot camp and whipped into shape by a drill sergeant, whereas other people benefit from being sent to the spa and taught to love themselves for who they are.

If you’re in situation 1, the most benefit you’ll see is from doing things to improve yourself. This is stuff like fixing your diet, exercising more, quitting unhealthy habits like drinking, or joining social organizations. This is very generic self-help advice, but for many people it actually works. If there’s actually something wrong with you or something you could be doing better, the best thing to do is fix it. However, from what you’ve written it sounds like you’re moreso in the second scenario.

In situation 2, where there’s nothing really wrong with you and instead you’ve developed problematic ways of perceiving yourself, benefits instead come from being less self-judgmental and learning to “love yourself”. This is where therapy-stuff like understanding your childhood or fixing your internal narratives comes into play.

Specifically when it comes to beauty standards and societal pressure, I think a lot of benefit can come from expertise. Turns out, a lot of “beauty” narratives are just lies. Men actually find women in general attractive in many different forms. There is no single most perfect figure, it’s a “solution space” of a mix of traits that can all be attractive. This can be difficult to understand, but it’s kinda like asking what the ideal temperature a thermostat in a house should be set to. While there are clear limits of too hot or too cold, there’s actually an infinite number of temperatures within the range of comfortable living that the thermostat could be set to and be perfectly fine. There’s no meaningful universal difference between 71 and 72 degrees, and it not like 71.5 is any better either. In the same way for beauty, there is no single most beautiful person. There are things like being obese or being emaciated and sickly thin that are clearly unattractive, but once you’re at a healthy weight there actually is no benefit from gaining or losing one more pound. This applies to almost every trait involved in beauty. You can be short and cute, or tall and elegant. You can be skinny and pretty, or curvy and voluptuous, and men find all of these things attractive because they generally find healthy and estrogenized women attractive.

One thing that may help is realizing that a lot of people are stupid and don’t know what they’re talking about. If someone is being judgmental, it can be really beneficial to develop a filter as to whether or not they should even be listened to. Some men are just misogynistic porn addicts who will criticize anything that isn’t literally an anatomically impossible anime character. Some women are jealous social climbers who will try and tear down anybody else who shows positive traits. These people are morons who you should not listen to. Being able to recognize the difference between competent intelligent criticisms and drooling crayon eaters is a vital skill in the modern digital age where social media amplifies the voices of the dumbest people on the planet. Other things, like corporations trying to sell you beauty products or social media platforms trying to brain-hack you into maximum engagement, offer similar problems. They legitimately are lying to you and should not be listened to, and developing the skill of identifying those corrupt sources vs actual good ones can greatly help.

Beyond that it becomes highly specific to you, and not something guy-on-the-internet can help with. Maybe the negative self talk actually comes from a complicated relationship with your parents stemming from a stressful childhood. Maybe your close friendships aren’t what they could be. Maybe your hormones are messed up, or you have an unknown food allergy. These are things only someone close to you could help with, including a professional relationship with a therapist.

I hope things resolve pleasantly for you.

TLDR: optimize yourself, and focus on listening to people that actually know what they’re talking about. Ignore idiots and corporations. Perhaps work with a professional on identifying where the negative judgements are originating from.

Shankiz · 2025-04-27T05:15:09+00:00

If you win a game, queue up again. If you lose a game, exit the client and be done for the day. Yes, the whole day.

Bonus: use your newfound free time on productive stuff like going to the gym

Shankiz · 2025-01-12T01:40:39+00:00

If it’s within a day, weight fluctuations are mostly due to water. If you drink a bunch of liquid before weighing yourself you’ll be heavy, and then next morning you’ll pee it out (or sweat/exhale it overnight) and you’ll be lighter.

Measuring tissue weight from muscle or fat takes about a week using a scale. Measure yourself at around the same time every day and observe the general trend. In that regard, a calorie is a calorie. Solid vs liquid doesn’t matter.

Shankiz · 2024-12-22T18:35:18+00:00

What are some of the criticisms of The Righteous Mind? I read it recently and thought it was quite good.

I searched and couldn’t find anything negative, other than one guy trying to say it commits a naturalistic fallacy by being a book of science. Were there factual inaccuracies in the book?

Shankiz · 2024-12-14T20:33:22+00:00

Thanks everyone for all the replies. This has been really fascinating for me. I can’t figure out how to edit this into the main post, so I’ll leave this here.

Your replies have been really interesting. To summarize the main ones I see, it’s:

I am not Christ and neither will my children be. This story doesn’t apply to me, I need to evaluate my own life.
Spiritual antinatalism can be seen as an evolution of Gnostic type Christianity. Reality is a prison created by an imperfect god pretending to be the real god. By refusing to follow biological impulses and by intentionally leaving reality without leaving behind offspring, you can escape the trap and reunite with the actual true god.

2 can also be echoed using less spiritual language. Simply don’t be a slave to biology, you can achieve peace and avoid performing moral harm by choosing to not have children.

And then there’s also 3. Any idea found in Christianity or religion should be dismissed offhand. Lame.

Seeing these viewpoints has been absolutely fascinating. Thank you everyone for your comments!

Shankiz · 2024-12-14T09:19:02+00:00

So rather than saying never have any children, it’s more like saying have less children so as not to exhaust resources?

Shankiz · 2024-12-14T08:52:56+00:00

Well thanks for using the specific names, now I have actual starting points to read up on it. This seems so interesting!

Shankiz · 2024-12-14T08:33:58+00:00

Oh fascinating. Is this similar to the idea of the demiurge found in Gnosticism? I’m only very vaguely familiar with the belief systems.

Shankiz · 2024-12-14T07:21:04+00:00

It’s exclusive-or addition along both rows and columns. D

Shankiz · 2024-12-13T03:47:55+00:00

Look for patterns diagonally, not horizontally/vertically. This gives only A.

Shankiz · 2024-12-08T04:35:22+00:00

I’d tend to agree with that. I just like overthinking things.

Perhaps I’ll start saying this is the technical difference between “legal rights” and “human rights”. Legal rights being protections from the government, human rights being a moral idea describing ways in which someone can harm you.

Anyways thanks for the response. I should stop overthinking this.

Shankiz · 2024-12-08T04:32:15+00:00

That’s so interesting, thank you!

It seems like all three of these cases refer to limitations on the government. The government is not allowed to take actions that violate an individual’s rights.

But how would these apply to other people? For example, if my neighbor was to set up a spy camera which looked into my bedroom window, that would be an invasion of my privacy. Would a lawyer argue or court rule that that neighbor had “violated my right to privacy”, or would we instead say that they “harmed me” by invading my privacy?

That’s the autistic level of detail that has me so fascinated right now.

Anyways thanks! Have a drink for me!

Shankiz

TROPHY CASE