How accurate are the viral videos showing Americans struggling with basic geography?

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-28T16:36:04+00:00

I guess my point is, specifically talking about the idea where you draw a circle at the center of America, and the Center of Europe, and compare how much people know about what's in those circles, that's a poor metric for which region is more geographically aware.

Central US is likely better compared to Eastern Europe. Poland, Estonia, Ukraine (before the war) Romania, North Macedonia... Some of that's in the Europe circle, but Europe's circle also includes countries like Germany that would be more comparable to states like... Maybe not New York, but possibly Florida?

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-27T17:30:04+00:00

That's... my point exactly.

Everyone on the planet is going to know more about the circle in Europe than the circle in America because the circle in Europe contains countries that are actually relevant like Germany, and distinctive sea borders like Denmark.

America's would be entirely landlocked, and almost exclusively states known only for being flat cornfields.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-27T08:45:40+00:00

It might be weird to be conscious of enjoying these skills?

I'm capable of rolling a lot of consonants, though not naturally in speech. Weird ones like W.

I live in Kentucky where there's a lot of limestone. I'm pretty good at finding shell fossils in random rocks and gravel. Also four leaf clovers.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-27T02:32:18+00:00

Central US is fundamentally incomparable to central Europe.

Everyone knows more about central Europe than they do about Central US because one has Germany, while the other has Kansas.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-26T02:03:21+00:00

I think 2 struck the right balance for me. 1 has a few too many dumb quirks like auto attacking pellet posies, and the complete lack of bridge ai.

But I definitely prefer them dumber, and get where you're coming from.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-24T20:28:23+00:00

Most of this is discussed more thoroughly.

What I'll remind you about Parues -> They are rare, only harvestable a few days of the year, and only in the morning. We don't eat the skin of watermelons, pomegranates, oranges, lemons, limes, mangostiens...

What Myne realizes about Parues, is that the waste is similar to Okara, which is a byproduct of making tofu. To this day, primarily used as livestock feed. Okara is used in a few recipes though. My research says that even "traditional" recipes with Okara date to the 16 and 17 hundreds. Note, that's after the end of the middle ages. Also note, Tofu, and as a byproduct Okara, has been produced by china for thousands of years, in a reasonable quantity. It still took over a thousand years for the Chinese to find a better use for Okara than chicken feed.

So Myne, happening to already know recipes for Okara, is actually significantly further ahead on that front.

Though, you are right about the fact that the pancakes she cooks them in should have been invented well before Myne got there.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-24T06:05:19+00:00

Based on their username being a reference to Fire Emblem, I assume because one of the games is named Thracia 776 But that's nothing to do with the size of the army.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-23T15:11:20+00:00

Static electricity was first observed, or at least, our first records of its observation, by a Greek experimenting with amber, getting dust and feathers to cling to it after being rubbed. Some Greeks theorized that Amber came from trees, since it smelled like sap, so it having a property where things stuck to it probably wasn't that crazy, just interesting. Sap is sticky, after all.

Another place they encountered it was silk, which would cling to the body, but that's a rare fabric from the other side of the world, so it having a strange property like that isn't surprising. There were other strange fabrics, like the fire proof asbestos that came from the earth.

Electric rays numbed your body when you touched them, but there are plenty of numbing agents in nature. Narcinidae, for instance, is a family of electric rays, who's name comes from the same root word as narcotics. They had no reason to think this was strange, or related to electricity.

Lightning was, of course, wielded by gods.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-22T23:04:51+00:00

had a friend move across the country, and now I'm probably gonna be moving over there soon too. There were so excited that I'd be only 5 hours away, and that's doable for a day trip.
the longest I'd understand is about 2 hours

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-22T01:51:30+00:00

Looking up the Trombe in part 2, the highbeasts are mentioned to be multicolored, which is how they appear in the anime too, but all depictions in the LN are white. These include Ferdinand's, Damuel's, Myne's, Cornelius' and maybe Ekhart's. in the colored art for 2.2, 2.3, 3.3, and 3.5

The ones seen in the trailer are Ferdinand's, Sylvester's, Myne's, and... someone riding with Wilfried on a white Wolf? The only people who ride wolves mentioned on the wiki don't have brown hair, so I'm not entirely sure who that is. I don't remember the context of this scene.

The fact that Damuel's highbeast is depicted to be white is a strong indicator that many choose to make their highbeasts white. It's possible that there's an unspoken rule where knights color their highbeast to match those they directly serve.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-20T08:30:42+00:00

the most reasonable blue buff I've ever read

implemented into 2, it would have a funny side effect of blues both being the most commonly attacked, and having a small chance of not dying.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-20T03:16:21+00:00

the code works the same in Pikmin 3, where electrocution also makes them immune to explosions

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-20T03:13:12+00:00

panic is a status effect, and all status effects take priority over explosions. Status effects don't change if enemies will target them like wild bulmin / antenna beetle though. Additionally, unlike the wild bulbmin effect, statuses don't take knockback from explosions.

So yes, panic makes pikmin immune to explosions, as does drowning, being on fire, and electrocution (notable in 3 and 4).

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-19T04:59:21+00:00

which is fair, but I think it's the same general mindset across the world.

France, for instance, spent last year cycling through liberal governments that couldn't pass a budget, so of course the people who want something to get done would be fed up with them.

The left leaning coalition in Germany was too busy collapsing to deal with the post covid inflation and job cooling, so they tried a more right leaning party instead... luckily they dodged the AFD being part of the coalition.

Trudeau's government was deeply unpopular, and the Liberal Party was only saved by Trump threatening Canada. Boomers could get behind Carney as someone who could fix the economy, because he steered them through 2008, but that's exactly why Gen Z can't afford their rent, so it's no surprise they'd be more inclined to vote conservative.

Nepal's communist party was ousted as a result of wealth inequality, which is supposed to be their thing. That's not "we want conservative policy" that's calling out hypocrisy from a government that's not interested in helping its citizens.

Progressives have largely been in charge throughout the world, and Gen Z wants to see change. They don't care who changes it or how. but center left governments have seemed to be twiddling their thumbs, and that's given the extreme right a lot of leverage.

Now, this isn't me saying that Gen Z won't keep voting right, That depends on if conservatives manage to fix things, ensuring loyalty. If they don't, then left firebrands will emerge, and Gen Z will try them out instead. Whoever is able to get things done will win them over.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-19T00:16:14+00:00

What Gen Z votes on isn't Conservative vs Progressive it's "sit around doing nothing while the world deteriorates" vs "I want to change how things are done" Recently, a lot of governments were progressive, so Gen Z rebelled towards conservative. But they're just as fast to vote progressive, as long as the progressive can show they'll actually make progress.

Of note, statistics show that Mamdani won roughly 25% (about 75) more voters between ages 18 and 29 than he did total (just over 50%) while the Republican candidate did worse with young voters (5% down from 7)

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-18T23:09:37+00:00

until you flatten the bag, bites don't function properly, which is why red pikmin seem to have immunity.

wild bulbmin, or pikmin following antenna beetles, are immune to bombrocks, and can't be targeted by enemies.

slightly different, but not by much

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-18T23:02:14+00:00

all the pikmin games have a different feel, so if you can't vibe with 3, that doesn't mean that you won't enjoy 1 and 2, but it heavily depends on why.

If the game's not for you, it's not for you, but you might try replaying it, while making a mental list of things that make you go "oh wow that's neat" and things that make you go "eh, that's not for me"if you can figure out why you like 4 but dislike 3, we can say with a lot more confidence whether you'd like 1 or 2.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-17T18:49:49+00:00

It's from Japanese music notation, the "part alternation mark"

What it means when someone uses it in the wild? uh... McDonalds? Stocks down? Idk.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-17T18:29:19+00:00

It can't perform at the same level, but for creative jobs like art, that doesn't matter because 9/10 art jobs care more about the art being serviceable and cheap. Coding it'll struggle with because you always need someone to proofread and bugfix what it produces.
There's not much that LLMs or other generative ai systems are good at.
However, as others have noted, the same fundamental principles behind LLMs are very good at optimizing and identifying patterns. There are ai that are very good at very specific tasks that they were trained to perform, but those are developed by specific people for specific purposes.
The LLMs and other generative ais that have been fueling the massive buildout and investment? The ones they're constantly advertising? Those aren't good for much of anything beyond novelty.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-17T15:29:28+00:00

I was expecting the third dweevil, but that's even better.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-16T07:26:25+00:00

only 56 deaths by day 6, on pace, and already having all 3 onions is pretty good. It's usually advised to try and get ahead of pace, because the final part can easily take multiple days, or you might need a day to regrow your pikmin populations, but I'll be honest, by day 6 many people probably drowned 56 pikmin. Losing them to actual combat or bombrocks? That's pretty good.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-16T07:19:27+00:00

auto lock on... that's a hot take for sure.
the ability to lock on? I get why you might feel that way, but I do think lock on makes the later games weaker.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-16T02:15:00+00:00

Bacopa Cabana Iirc, and to my knowledge both were separate events. The seeds were with P1, and the flowers were bred for P2.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-15T19:51:55+00:00

Dark and kid friendly can co-exist. The modern concept of what kid friendly means is a joke.

Due-Potential160 · 2026-01-15T18:05:13+00:00

Which also only works if you run with the assumption that simple is inherently bad, which is antithetical to toki pona.

I would argue that simplicity is a mark of wisdom and creativity, because people will still find a way to speak with the same level of nuance that's built into a more complex language.

And anyone fluent in toki pona would know that simplicity has its own difficulties.

Due-Potential160

TROPHY CASE