Recent comments in /f/askscience

Fit_Lawfulness_3147 t1_jduslek wrote

Reply to comment by pavlik_enemy in Does living in an airplane flight path, near an airport, pose a health risk? What happens to the lead from the jets fuel? by [deleted]

As previously commented upon, lead is an anti knock additive. It increases the octane number. The higher the engine’s compression ratio, the higher the required octane number. The higher the compression ratio the more power the the engine can produce. SO… small aircraft need high octane fuel in order to keep the engine(s) small (light).

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hal2k1 t1_jduqtzl wrote

Reply to If there was a hole in the ISS, would everyone get sucked out like in Sci-Fi movies? by hobbitlover

Vacuums don't suck. Rather pressure presses. The air pressure inside the ISS pushes the air in the ISS out through a hole in the hull.

So if you are near the hole in the hull the air in the middle of the ISS that is pressing to get out the hole in the hull pushes on you as well. If however you were near the wall furthest away from the hole in the hull there wouldn't be much air behind you (with respect to the hole) pushing you towards the hole. So you would likely die from lack of air eventually rather than via being pushed out the hole.

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amaurea t1_jduoxhb wrote

Reply to comment by PHealthy in Do most animals have to worry about complications from cannibalization? by StressfulRiceball

I think we're talking past each other because some basic assumptions are left unstated. I think these are:

  • Healthy individuals have zero prions
  • The body cannot defend against any level of prions. Once they're in, they're bound to replicate until they reach fatal levels.

If those are true, then I agree that transmission is all that matters. If they aren't true, then the prion level would matter, and bioaccumulation (or really biomagnification) could come into the picture. I read something recently about defense mechanisms called "chaperones" that restore prions to the correct shape. It would also be odd for cells to have no defense against a problem that's surely been around for billions of years. So that's the background for my question.

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pavlik_enemy t1_jduog5n wrote

Reply to comment by janoc in Does living in an airplane flight path, near an airport, pose a health risk? What happens to the lead from the jets fuel? by [deleted]

I guess even if the engine is made yesterday it still made with obsolete tech by automotive standards. As far as I understand there was no push for advanced engine tech like fuel injection and ECUs in GA after WW2 neither from customers nor from regulators because whatever was available was good enough and all high-performance applications switched to jets.

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Psykout88 t1_jduo3em wrote

Reply to comment by [deleted] in Can elephants canter or gallop? by [deleted]

Okay, let me rephrase this. Also, don't private message me again, that is weird. Stop taking this personally and reflect on your approach.

When you ask a question to someone but then immediately ignore them, it's always going to have a bad look. You didn't even ask a follow-up question, you just went back to "nah I think I am right." So it has nothing to do with your curiosity and everything to do with you being unable to let go of your initial assumption into a matter you clearly don't understand.

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