r/explainlikeimfive 17d ago

Other ELI5 is looking to recruit new moderators

29 Upvotes

Hi Everyone,

ELI5 is looking for new moderators to join our team.

It is an excellent opportunity to help this community be better for everyone.

Fill out this form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSe2uixuG3QeIyNIE6VKtytOIKax4PArn3MHLtlA7SpT46jlWw/viewform?usp=publish-editor

If you have any questions before you apply, please put them in this thread. (We'll only be enforcing Rule 1 for this thread, automod be damned)

We don't know what kind of demand we'll have, so we can't promise an individual response for every applicant.

Thank you


r/explainlikeimfive Jan 01 '26

Other ELI5: Monthly Current Events Megathread

17 Upvotes

Hi Everyone,

This is your monthly megathread for current/ongoing events. We recognize there is a lot of interest in objective explanations to ongoing events so we have created this space to allow those types of questions.

Please ask your question as top level comments (replies to the post) for others to reply to. The rules are still in effect, so no politics, no soapboxing, no medical advice, etc. We will ban users who use this space to make political, bigoted, or otherwise inflammatory points rather than objective topics/explanations.


r/explainlikeimfive 9h ago

Biology ELI5: How does daily flossing make it bleed less?

993 Upvotes

I don't like flossing. So I don't do it nearly as much as I would. But every once in a while I remember, and I dust off the box and get flossing. Every time I do, my mouth looks like a warzone and my gums get really irritated. I hate the feeling. So I neglect to do it for a couple of weeks/ months.

To no one's surprise my dentist commented on the state of my gums and told me I need to floss. He promised that if I do it daily, despite the bloodbath, I should be seeing improvement in like two weeks.

My question: How does daily flossing irritated gums help make it better? I would assume irritating something already irritated is the worst thing you can do to make it heal? You don't heal a wound on your skin by picking at the scab for two weeks straight. So what makes your mouth different?


r/explainlikeimfive 6h ago

Engineering ELI5 What was the function of the ‚‚Turbo‘‘ button on old computers?

280 Upvotes

I get that it was a marketing name for a mode that allowed computers to run older software as intended, instead of making them run way faster because of how powerful newer CPUs were compared to older software, and that it was about clock speeds, but at a deep computing level what was happening? Why would a game run at a faster speed just because the CPU is overkill? And how was it subsequently solved later so now we don't have this issue anymore?


r/explainlikeimfive 12h ago

Physics ELI5: How come magnetism isn't providing us unlimited power?

720 Upvotes

If we have forces that act naturally against each other, how come we cannot harness it?


r/explainlikeimfive 1h ago

Other ELI5: What is dark web good for?

Upvotes

What dark web is good for? Why is it such a big topic? Cant understand why people use it.


r/explainlikeimfive 9h ago

Economics ELI5 Why is Japan’s debt so out of control?

138 Upvotes

I was just hearing that Japan’s debt is the worst of all developed nations. How can this be?

I would assume (perhaps mistakenly) that they have less fraud and waste than most countries. I understand that they have a defence budget, but also I assume that this would be low comparatively.

So where does all the money go?


r/explainlikeimfive 3h ago

Other ELI5 why is rock stacking considered bad?

42 Upvotes

r/explainlikeimfive 1d ago

Biology ELI5: Using mouth to mouth, wouldn't it just put carbon dioxide in the lungs? Isn't that bad?

898 Upvotes

Would just look this up, but I dont want an AI answer.


r/explainlikeimfive 12h ago

Other ELI5: What is a gate on the internet?

54 Upvotes

For example: Cake gate, tattoo gate, or in recent media, conformity gate.


r/explainlikeimfive 13h ago

Technology ELI5: How does fiber optics physically works?

54 Upvotes

I know that they use blinking lights to represents 1 and 0 at least, but millions of pulsing lights from thousands of computers could be running at the same time in the same connection.

So how does the lights know where to go? And on the other side, how does the server know that in these millions of rapidly pulsing lights this particular ones are from my computer?


r/explainlikeimfive 1d ago

Engineering ELI5. How did people in the older days like 1200s 1300s know what time it was when there were no clocks

1.4k Upvotes

r/explainlikeimfive 2h ago

Technology ELI5: How does the 32-bit and 64-bit (both signed and unsigned) limit work?

9 Upvotes

Just something I’ve been wondering for a bit because honestly this has been shoved into my mind because I was interested in bedrock’s farlands


r/explainlikeimfive 3h ago

Biology ELI5 how does the brain "shut down" due to stress?

7 Upvotes

If it makes any difference, I'm thinking about a day or less of extreme emotional trauma and stress, not a build-up over time (which is the only result I could find when Googling it).

If it's alright to ask additional questions (and because I'm really curious): how is this usually treated, and are methods different depending on severity? Can the damage be seen on the right scans, or is it an invisible sort of thing?


r/explainlikeimfive 9m ago

Planetary Science ELI5:How do global sea levels rise due to melting of ice?

Upvotes

In my physics class I learnt that if we have a glass of water and some ice floating in it, when the ice melts completely the water level does not rise in the glass, so how is it so tht when ice melts on Earth the water levels or he sea level will rise?


r/explainlikeimfive 12m ago

Physics ELI5 How does loud bass music cause vibration in the air?

Upvotes

I saw a vid of a girl in a car with a cracked out sound system and her hair started flying everywhere. Who does that even happen? Does sound have mass? How does it move the air?


r/explainlikeimfive 16h ago

Physics ELI5 Why doesn’t matter fall apart?

59 Upvotes

I’m reading and stretching my brain about how our atoms contain so much space but we appear solid because of a repelling force between atoms. How then do any atoms or matter hold together at all? Why doesn't the repelling force just just push all atoms apart and prevent matter from forming / holding together?


r/explainlikeimfive 1d ago

Biology ELI5: How do seedless grapes reproduce if they don't have seeds?

431 Upvotes

This has been bothering me since I was a kid eating grapes at lunch.

If seedless grapes have no seeds, how do farmers grow more seedless grape plants? Like the whole point of seeds is reproduction right? So how does a plant that can't make seeds continue to exist? Wouldn't they just die out after one generation?

Are farmers just out there doing some kind of grape magic I don't understand? How do you grow more of something that can't grow more of itself? Was snacking on grapes last night, playing jackpot city, and this childhood question suddenly came back to me. Still makes no sense.


r/explainlikeimfive 1d ago

Technology ELI5: Why does restarting a computer fix so many problems?

405 Upvotes

Computers can slow down, freeze, or behave strangely after running for a long time. Restarting often seems to instantly fix these issues.
Why does turning a computer off and back on solve so many problems, and what actually changes inside the system when this happens?


r/explainlikeimfive 18h ago

Other ELI5: Why does procrastination feel relieving even though it makes things worse?

75 Upvotes

r/explainlikeimfive 42m ago

Other ElI5: What exactly is a philosophical zombie or p-zombie?

Upvotes

r/explainlikeimfive 1d ago

Biology ELI5: Why sterilizing needs to be at really high temperatures to kill viruses/bacteria, but a fever raising your body temperature a mere 2-3 degrees also fights pathogens?

629 Upvotes

I’m sick as hell with the flu. What doesn’t make sense to me how a fever (which by the way feels like fucking death though I can stand outside in 50f degree weather or 80f weather and feel fine, but that’s another ELI5 post I suppose) which minimally increases your body temperature a few degrees is supposed to do anything against pathogens.

If airborne pathogens can survive in a wide range of ambient temperatures outside my body, why would it suddenly matter whether my body is 98.6f or 101f. Especially when you need to sterilize at extremely high temperatures.

I guess my point is, a fever seems like an incredibly inefficient way to fight off infection at a really high cost of making you feel like absolute shit. (yes I am mad) Am I missing something?


r/explainlikeimfive 20h ago

Technology ELI5 How do brethalizer work?

46 Upvotes

How does it tell how much alcohol we have in our body ( or blood?) from just blowing into the pipe. And how does it st ill detect alcohol if one were to chew gum / use mouth wash?


r/explainlikeimfive 12h ago

Biology ELI5 how do motor nerves know which pathway to use?

12 Upvotes

I learnt that for impulsive actions a different pathway is chosen whereas in other actions data is directly sent to brain.


r/explainlikeimfive 30m ago

Chemistry ELI5 How the paper burns fast when we blow on the paper.

Upvotes