My mom was playing Jeopardy on her Alexa and one of the questions was about a state in Mexico. Her boyfriend, who was very drunk, adamantly insists that it’s a trick question because “Mexico doesn’t have states.” It’s literally called the United Mexican States. Two of my aunts are from Mexico. It took like two hours to get him off the subject.
Confidently ignorant people really bother me. Even if I thought that I would’ve thought “Is that true?” and spent a second googling it. It is amazing how some folks are devoid of even the slightest curiosity but are blindly overconfident.
Toss up : a coworker who I would have counted as quite intelligent said we haven’t been to the moon because “it’s impossible to launch a rocket to the moon and land on it because rockets go in a straight line. Trying to time the shot of the rocket, and get to the moon at the exact moment when the moon gets to the right spot would be astronomically impossible. The odds of pulling that off at the speed you would be traveling and the distance you travel… Well the odds are effectively zero.”
"Also you can’t catch up to the moon because the moon is traveling faster then our rockets can go "
Either that or a prochoice individual who voted for Trump…
How does this person think guided missiles work? “Well the plane moved so we missed.”
"Also you can’t catch up to the moon because the moon is traveling faster then our rockets can go "
- Not true so discussion over right there
- Even if its angular velocity was faster than a rocket its radial velocity is nearly 0 so all you would have to do to intercept it is to lead it. No different than shooting a moving target at long ranges.
If you really want to confuse most folks tell them why shooting stuff into the sun is actually VERY hard to do.
Okay im curious. What about shooting something into the sun is very hard?
The earth has a lot of angular momentum, in fact the planets combined have more than the sun and planet formation may actually be necessary to “bleed off” angular momentum from protostellar discs for star formation, but I digress. So if you were to aim directly at the sun you’d miss it wildly as the tangential motion of the earth would be added to your motion. Even worse it would miss the sun, go around it, and orbit back to where you came from. A bad thing if you were trying to toss, say, radioactive waste into the sun. To hit the sun you have to bleed off all of that angular momentum by using rockets (very expensive) or do what NASA usually does and use gravity assists swinging by planets to gain or lose energy. The Parker solar probe had to do a bunch of swings past Venus to lose enough angular momentum to get close to the sun.
I was assuming rockets were an option like going to the moon. Cost wasnt something i thought we were factoring in thats not really a factor in just trying to send a space ship at the sun and having it get there. It doesnt have to be moving fast (relatively) to get there so you just need good aim and to keep it on track.
Cost should be its own problem separate from the objective. Assume 0 costs, how hard would it be?
It requires a LOT of energy to counter the earth’s orbital motion. Hitting the moon is different because the moon is traveling with the earth and you are going outwards. Energy is always part of the equation since orbital mechanics is all about energy. You can’t ignore it by saying “Assume 0 costs, how hard would it be?” then we could just say it can approach the speed of light since we are ignoring any energy costs.
“It doesnt have to be moving fast”
But you will be moving fast, you are starting at an angular speed of 30km/s. The Apollo missions with their massive engines reached 11 km/s. Now think of someone wanting to dump hundreds of tons of nuclear waste into the sun and the energy that would require.
Maybe this explains it better:
i got into an argument with my in law about a 60$ sticker to block the ‘waves’ on my phone. for my health. and my phone will still work… it was a hologram sticker.
The moment I knew that I had to break it off with my ex was when a comment about tea-cup saucers turned into an accusation that I “always had to be right”.
We were having cake for dessert:
Her: “Can you grab plates?”
Me: Grabs a couple of small plates.
Her: “No, those aren’t for cake. It’s the really small ones.”
Me: “Okay, but FYI the small ones are actually teacup saucers. You can tell the difference because they have the indent in the middle so the teacup doesn’t slip around.”
Her: “You just always have to be right, don’t you?”
What followed was a truly bonkers argument where I found myself accused of “lording my intelligence” and told that I had to be right in everything.
For the record, I told her I literally didn’t give a shit what she wants to eat cake off of. I’m the guy that would happily use a Tupperware lid as a plate if it was the closest thing to hand. I was just pointing out an “interesting fact” (in my mind at least).
How dare you point out something. Stop hurting her feelings by pointing out anything she doesn’t know. “I would’ve pointed out you were about to drink soap but then I’d ‘Always need to be right’.”
That is essentially the vibe I got from that argument. We didn’t last much longer after that.
you’re right. Saucers (despite the English name) are meant to drink beverages, therefore they are small glasses, not small plates
My wife and I bought 10 lottery tickets at a time when the pot got up to 300 million or something like that. we were talking about what we would would do with the money once we won and couldn’t agree on how many of our friends mortgages we would pay off. we MAY have had some other things going on in a relationship at that time, but it’s still one of the stupidest arguments I’ve ever gotten in.
Any time I think of the lottery I can’t help thinking of this infamous reddit post that should be mandatory reading by anyone who wins.
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/24vo34/comment/chb4v05
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/24vo34/comment/chb4yin
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/24vo34/comment/chb51su
I like to believe that I would pay off mortgages for immediate family, and buy a house for any immediate members who don’t have one. If I have some left over I would think about extended family and friends.
I think I’m with your wife on this one.
I really shouldn’t respond to this since I’m just rehashing up one of the stupidest arguments I’ve ever had. but, what you said is actually pretty close to what my position was. we parted ways when it came to the more distant cousins. I suggested a cool hundred K USD out to second cousins 'cause, after all, 300 million doesn’t buy as much as it used to
but surprisingly, it didn’t really matter because we didn’t win the lottery. imagine that. /s.
My lesson learned was that arguing on principle isn’t usually worth it
Oh, when I said “I’m with your wife”, I meant physically. No way do I agree with her.
HA! sick burn
I’d make trust funds for them and make it clear that this was it. If you give them cash they will hate you because you gave them only $1,000,000 a year ago and didn’t give them more this year.
Oh no, no cash. Just a large asset that will appreciate, and that’s it
Obligatory mention: Full Body Workout Every Other Day?
Or if you’d prefer it in video form: https://youtu.be/eECjjLNAOd4
the one where the democrats are the ‘party of slavery’ because of what the parties stood for in 1860. yeah that’s why I’m voting for Lincoln and the union this year dumbfucks
And yet California—a solidly blue state—just voted by public referendum to uphold slavery. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_California_Proposition_6
They might want to look up how the parties flipped during the civil rights era.
In a video someone discussed the average us household income. Someone commented that that number was actually inflated and it would be better to use median. I found the article the OP was referencing and pointed out that it was in fact the median and pointed out a median is a type of average. They argued for far far too long that average exclusively refers to mean, that median “isn’t even an expected value” and that they were right and I was wrong because they are an engineer who works with this all day long. I ended up getting ganged up by several different accounts, I eventually screenshotted the Wikipedia page for average and got them to all delete their posts.
Average vs mean vs median is always a clusterfuck argument waiting to happen.
I was talking with someone from the UK about this article that they showed me. They were outraged by it, and I said I don’t see what the problem is with it. They were weirdly fixated on the “asylum seekers” part, to which I told them the article says it will apply to vulnerable persons regardless of immigration status, and I asked them why they were fixating so much on this applying to one specific demographic.
This caused them to go on a tirade about “migrants are getting more rights than people who were born in this country” and how they aren’t a racist because they married an Italian. They said “it’s all about divide and conquer” and I asked them why they care so much about what ethnicity or nationality a person is, over if they’re vulnerable and receiving healthcare equality or not. This quickly devolved into them going on about how the UK is “being taken over by migrants”. So, I asked them if they knew any of these migrants, if the UK is “being taken over” by them. They said no.
This started from them watching a YouTube video made by some influencer who was getting angry over the same article. I’m more than convinced that social media can have its bad sides.
Let’s give more money to billionaires, they will make us rich too.
Ah, trickle-down economics. A tale as old as time.
Whether if something is deceptively [a trait] does it mean it’s the inverse of the trait or more of the trait than it appears, ie: if you call something deceptively shallow, does that mean it is shallow, but looks deep, or that it is deep but looks shallow. Hours of arguing with my family and checking numerous sources, we came to the conclusion that the phrasing can be used either way.
An event that happens biweekly could occur at the same frequency as an event that happens bimonthly.
Shouldn’t that be semi-monthly? Rounding months to 4 weeks, of course.
Or maybe that’s just me wanting bi and semi to have consistent meanings. Bi is two, semi is a half.
Probably should be, but isn’t. Bimonthly can mean twice a month or every two months.
Goddamit. I was so certain it was the inverse, and now here I am debating myself
You’re debating whether not-3 is the same as “less than three”.
It’s => but not <= so it’s not ==.
AAAAHHH
You can thank me later
I fought with my aunt about “mom jeans.” I was telling her it was a style of jeans and she was adament that it was any kind of jeans that a “mother” is wearing.
Well technically you are both right though she is being pedantic.
Well, definitely arguing with my mom over me going outside in winter with hair that wasn’t fully dry, when I didn’t have time or I’d miss the bus and be late for college. I usually dry my hair enough that if I cover it with a hood or hat during colder days I’m perfectly fine, but she insists that one of these days going out with wet hair in the cold is gonna get me sick, which has never happened. I ain’t changing the habit of not fully drying my hair after I get sick from going out with wet hair and that is the sole cause of me getting sick (so, probably never).
I’d hike across campus in college with wet hair and it would be frozen solid by the time I got to class in the winter. lol
I’m lucky I don’t live in an area where it normally gets cold enough for my hair to freeze during the cold season. Closest I’ve ever had to that was a miserably cold winter last year. Only subzero winter I’ve ever been in and I would never wish it even on my worst enemies.
This happens every time I go outside without a coat during winter. If I’m going to the grocery store, and I’m only outside for 60 seconds, I dont need a coat. Obviously if I was going on a hike then I’d need it.
Where’d this myth even come from about cold causing colds? Its even in the name! I can’t imagine how many hours of pointless arguing occurred between parents and children because of it
Kinda related, I studied in Spain for a semester. Was taking with my fellow American roommate about the debate of if a tomato is a fruit or vegetable. Our host mom’s daughter’s boyfriend (Cuban, fwiw) overheard, and we told him about the “controversy” in the US but all 3 of us agreed it was a fruit. Host mom overheard us and asked what we were talking about, and the Cuban told her. “Well yeah, of course it’s a vegetable”
I couldn’t understand every word but when I could tell they were arguing about some vegetables having seeds or something like that I knew I spread something.
People think of fruits as having to be sweet and tomatoes are acidic and are used like non-fruit vegetables in cooking so I can see why someone who hasn’t thought about botanical definitions would think that way.
I can’t remember the specifics (both because it was dumb and because it’s so embarrassing I think my brain is trying to protect me), but from what I recall I got into a heated argument on the internet with someone because I felt that fans weren’t cheering hard enough for a band I liked at a concert.
…yeah, I know. I’m grateful, though, because it was so colossally stupid and pointless that I had a come-to-Jesus moment and swore off internet arguments entirely. I can only imagine the countless hours of my life it’s saved me in the intervening years.
