askscience

Title	Upvotes	Mark as read	Favorited	Rating	Add to a list
Weird and probably hard to test question: do we dream in coherent narratives or does our sleeping brain shoot out a bunch of random sensations that our waking brain organizes into narratives because human cognition tends see patterns even in meaningless noise?	1
Is there a latency period for human vitamin D production upon UVB exposure, or are skin cells synthesizing vitamin D as soon as exposed? Would we get the same amount of vitamin D from 60 ten-second periods of sunlight as from a single 10 minute period of sunlight?	1
There are tons of secondarily aquatic tetrapod lineages but are there/were there any tetrapods that became aquatic and then terrestrial again? Is it "harder" to come onto land than it is to go into the water/evolve aquatic adaptations?	1
Are hardness and toughness always directly inverse in uniform materials? Should I expect that with any two given metals the one that is harder will always be less tough (more brittle) than the other? And that a third metal of intermediate hardness will also have intermediate toughness?	1
Do semelparous species/genera go extinct at a higher rate than iteroparous ones? I.e. are "one and done" reproducers (mayflies, salmon) more fragile than repeat reproducers (humans, crocodiles) as species?	1
How do the ways the human brain and endocrine system respond to generically pleasant music vs. specifically relaxing music differ? And does this also apply to other mammal brains, specifically our common domestic pets?	1
Some states give broad legal protection to pilots and controllers against prosecution for loss of life due to error or negligence while others do not. Is there a measurable difference in safety of passengers and the public's perception of risk under these different schemes?	1
What's responsible for the oddly distributed patterns of oxidization/patina on the Statue of Liberty especially on her left side?	1
What's responsible for the oddly distributed patterns of oxidization/patina on the Statue of Liberty especially on her left side?	1
How far away could a planet like Jupiter be from Earth before we'd no longer be able (optically) discern its surface details with the best satellites/telescopes we currently have?	1

« < > »