Is it a quirk of translation?

Open to any answers regarding Europe and the US, too, as well as earlier time periods.

So there were no answers at /r/askscience but the relation between the two is pretty obvious. Now what could /r/askhistorians tell me more about this subject?

I was wondering about this the other day, and I couldn't recollect any specific point where the trend appears. Was it an old custom that evolved over time, or was it something in response to the housing boom post-WW2? I may be wildly off, but I would love to hear some insight.

I have heard that to this day the Pyramids are so tightly fitted you can't fit a piece of paper between the blocks. However, this only seems possible if it hasn't settled unevenly in the past few thousand years, and that just seems so unlikely to me on such a large 'unsecured' building. From what I have heard the Pyramids are basically just a pile of really well cut stones. They aren't cemented together at all.

Did the Egyptians have advance knowledge of construction, or were they just lucky in where they were placed and materials used? Could this be duplicated today and last as long as the Pyramids have?

I consider Russians as part of the western civilization.

Even today the rest of the world imitates the products designed/invented in the western world. The products and the processes seems to get imitated faster than, the quality of western society which leads to such products.

I sit here in my room in Asia, and there is little around me that was invented in this continent. Plastics, Semiconductors, Motors, Electric Lighting, Cathode Ray tubes, Smokeless cooking ranges, Electric heaters for water and air, Air conditioners, Refrigerators, Microwave ovens, Radio communication, Fibre optical communication, Phones, Mass & Cheaply manufactured products to name just the broad categories of western inventions I see around me.

Why is this so?

Everyone knows the achievements of Rome, Persia, and Greece, but I don't know a lot about what the Ottomans did, despite them being much more recent than any of the ones previously mentioned. So what are the Ottoman's crowning achievements?

And if the phrase "I have a boyfriend" wasn't initially synonymous with "I'm dating him" what did it originally mean?

The puff-n-stuff look is a bit of a mystery it seems. While the reason poodles are able to have these haircuts are pretty obvious, because they are one of a few dog breeds that have hair (that keeps growing) rather than fur (that sheds at a certain length), they're not the only one! Likewise, the oldest images of poodles show some more interesting haircuts but nothing standardized or very extreme like the modern show clip.

I have read two competing theories on various parts of the Internet - one, it comes from their sporting heritage and it is to keep joints warm while minimizing amount of overall coat for burr collection; or two, it comes from their pretty long pedigree as circus dogs. So what's the real scoop? When and where did these haircuts come from?

I was thinking about this the other day. How long ago did keeping a census of population begin? It is a fairly modern thing?

Choosing the nuclear bomb brought a lot of attention to it, and if it wasn't used then it would of made the world less aware of it. I know that there were Russian spies during the Manhattan Project, when creating the bomb, so they would of still know about it.

To my knowledge both Germany and Italy formed rather late compared to other European nations, despite having (I think) some form of national identity; so my question is why did it take so long for that to happen?

This will probably be a pretty easy question to answer, but I was curious as to why the steppes of Asia didn't develop like the American prairies in the United States. My understanding is that steppes and prairies are similar types of biomes. Maybe they did? Maybe they are drastically different ecologically and I'm just an idiot?

Note: I think the answer is probably that it's not feasible/ not similar to American prairies, but I'm not sure.

I'm doing research for an upcoming personal project, and google is being less than helpful. Any help provided is much appreciated!

(before the Roman Empire being split)

Just wondering if racism was a big deal back then or if there was discrimination or bigotry based on regions?

Is there any truth to such events portrayed in movies?

Where 2 armies meet and the leaders decide to pick 1 strongest men from each army to fight in a duel?