How does braille work? It is a system of writing where you can feel the dots that make up letters and read with your fingers. It is for people who are blind or visually impaired. It is estimated that there are 43 million blind people and a further 295 million people with moderate to severe […]
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Why did knights start wearing armor? Technological advances in metallurgy and changes in society made it possible. Soldiers have always used some type of protection, be it a shield or a helmet. Very few people want to go into battle with only a sword and nothing to protect them. The first type of plate armor
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What caused the Great Vowel Shift? It was a very large change in pronunciation that happened in England between 1400 and 1700. Nobody knows exactly what caused it. If you try to read Chaucer’s Canterbury tales, you will be able to string the letters together into words and you can probably understand what quite a
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Why is an Academy Award called an Oscar? There are many theories, but no one knows the actual reason why. The Academy Awards are awarded once a year, usually in February or March. They are the most important and coveted of all the awards for movies. They are watched by millions of people around the
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What does it mean to impeach a president? Impeachment is the process by which any federal official can be charged for doing something wrong and then removed from office. When we think of impeachment, we probably think of Bill Clinton and Donald Trump being impeached. Or perhaps we think of Richard Nixon resigning before he
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Which came first, the orange fruit of the color orange? The fruit came first. Oranges were first called oranges in the 13th century. The word orange was first used as a color in 1502. Oranges are not just one fruit. There are over 400 different types of orange around the world, and they all have
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How does a telescope work? They used to use lenses, but modern telescopes use mirrors. The first telescopes used lenses in the same way that a camera or a magnifying glass does. The first telescope was made by Hans Lipperhey, a German-Dutch spectacle maker. He used lenses to make glasses and he knew that concave
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Why doesn’t the Autobahn have a speed limit? The Autobahn didn’t have a speed limit when they were introduced in Germany and it was left without one. Trying to apply a speed limit later on was met with a lot of resistance. Germany is the only country in the world that has roads without speed
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Is modern art still modern? It technically applies to the period that lasted from the 1860s to the 1970s, so modern art is not modern art anymore, if that makes any sense. Postmodern art came after it and right now, we are living in the post-modern contemporary art era. We have an image of modern
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What is a blood diamond? They are diamonds that are mined in a war zone and used to finance the war. They are called “blood diamonds” because of all the blood that is spilled getting them and all the blood that is spilled from the profits of selling them. They are also called conflict diamonds.
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