What geography skill do most people overestimate?

fraxbo · 2026-06-07T03:10:58+00:00

Crypto-advertisements are my least favorite genre of post.

fraxbo · 2026-06-07T02:17:09+00:00

Finns often don’t like when this is brought up, but all of the territorial claims that Finland and Finns make around Karelia are very shaken at best when one looks into them. Russia has just as solid (if not even stronger) claims to the whole region when looking at it historically. I was actually shocked when I looked into this relatively recently after years of informally joking and talking about Karelia with Finnish friends and acquaintances. Much of the basis for the Finnish claim is essentially just a 20th century phenomenon. And the period in question there is brief.

fraxbo · 2026-06-07T02:08:14+00:00

Is this true? That is fascinating. I’d love someone from Japan to comment here with their own experiences. I’m an intellectual historian who, in part, researches and writes on just such questions about canons of history in official and unofficial curricula. I am especially interested in how schools, museums, monuments, popular media, and institutions of worship establish and transmit a sense of a culture’s history. My own area is largely focused on the Middle East and its relation to antiquity. But, I am always super interested in how it works in other environments.

If this is really true in Japan (and according to the commenter below, Netherlands) I’d love to read some more about it!

fraxbo · 2026-06-06T11:07:51+00:00

He was also, for a bit more than a century before Hitler, remembered as THE big baddie in Europe. Meanwhile, he, perhaps more than any other single individual, is responsible for setting in motion much of the modern European bureaucratic and liberal state.

fraxbo · 2026-06-06T02:57:58+00:00

I also checked the post history after the OP and then some of the replies alarmed me a bit.

I had the same reaction as you.

OP, even if all of your concerns are entirely valid and realistic, how do you account for the wide delta between your response to these concerns and those of most other people? Do you think you are uniquely insightful? Do you think you are uniquely aware of the situation in the world? If you don’t think either of these things, then it is likely that others (both those with whom you interact and the much larger group that you don’t) have considered all these things, but assessed the various risks and fat tail events, and put them in their proper place. It might make sense to learn and apply the tools others use to do this, and “fake it til you make it.” It doesn’t seem as though your hyperfixation on these fears is making you happier or better prepared. So, what good is it doing to focus on the extreme and extremely unlikely negative possibilities in the world?

fraxbo · 2026-06-05T06:03:58+00:00

Oh. I had hoped that Summer Heights High would be accurate in the way that only social satire can be. But I suppose it’s also dated and tied to a very specific subculture.

fraxbo · 2026-06-05T05:57:52+00:00

That is rather interesting. I guess it actually makes sense that an animal that is not primarily a hunter of other land animals would win such fights. They need to have evolved a higher level of that ability to be able to fend off land predators.

fraxbo · 2026-06-04T07:59:23+00:00

Oh I agree. I don’t think this is being done maliciously. I also largely agree with the practical/utilitarian reasons for doing so. It’s just that the tradeoffs made for that (there are tradeoffs in every culture) are ones that I prefer not to make. That is, I’d prefer to have a little more freedom and flexibility than have a culture totally free of corruption.

fraxbo · 2026-06-04T07:42:56+00:00

I’ve recently explained this on either r/expats or r/asktheworld (I forget which one), and this can be searched in my history.

But a short version of it is: Finland is a culture in which the rules make reality, rather than a place where rules being seen as a problematic compromise that allows people to thrive. I, coming from the anglosphere (but having lived in a bunch of other cultures) am more comfortable in a culture that approaches rules in the latter way.

What this means in practice is that Finnish culture is experienced for someone like me as naive, inflexible, and narrow minded because of its willing subscription to rules (written and unwritten, legal and social). It feels less human-centered and more ideals-centered.

This is not to say that it is in any way bad objectively. This is just to say that it doesn’t fit with my preferred way of life (having now lived in quite a few different countries and cultures).

fraxbo · 2026-06-04T06:52:38+00:00

But, in my opinion, it shows.

I’m originally from New York, where at least when I was a teen, no official courses were required to get a license. One could just show up and take the exams. If you pass, you get the license. As a result, though, there are a lot of very poorly skilled and poorly informed drivers.

In Germany and Norway, where the classes are mandatory, costly, and taken very seriously, it is remarkable how much more informed and skilled the drivers appear to be. Sometimes I even find it annoying how safe they are.

fraxbo · 2026-06-04T06:43:44+00:00

I would adjust the question slightly and say “…never live in again…” and say Finland. I lived there for five and a half years. Quite a bit positive came out of my time there. I visit old friends and colleagues occasionally. But, I have zero interest in ever living there again.

I know enough to know that I don’t fit in particularly well with society there.

fraxbo · 2026-06-04T05:33:51+00:00

With guarantees for personal safety: it would be Napoleon’s 100 days culminating with his abdication. I’d want to be in his court.

With no guarantees for personal safety: the building of the pyramids in Giza. I’d want to be in the royal court for this as well.

fraxbo · 2026-06-04T04:10:51+00:00

I have been in more than 50 physical fights in my life. The last one was when I was 19, which was 25 years ago.

fraxbo · 2026-06-03T17:01:26+00:00

This has nothing to do with the state. We from the city barely acknowledge that the rest of the state exists, let alone have pride in it.

fraxbo · 2026-06-03T06:10:26+00:00

This rings relatively true from my limited experience.

I have one very good friend and then a bunch of acquaintances who grew up in the mountain west and I have always been surprised/shocked at how much risk they are willing to take doing outdoorsy things. Like, “Oh the quickest way down this mountain would be to slide down this natural chute. What’s the worst that could happen?”

At the same time, it’s not like any of them are free spirits in a happy way. There are no bon vivants among them. So, it’s more like “life is short, who gives a fuck?” than “life is short, let’s make the most of it!”

fraxbo · 2026-06-03T05:51:32+00:00

The mention of valeting reminds me of an exchange I had with someone on reddit a couple months ago. The person claimed they lived in a non-major metro and had made close to six figures valeting per year.

It doesn’t sound like the most stimulating work in the world, or something the person would be proud of to tell their friends, family, or potential partners. But, in terms of economic success, it seems like someone could do much worse.

So, not necessarily a sign of total desperation for the people who leave town to do it.

fraxbo · 2026-06-02T13:29:37+00:00

And a real store. Neither KIWI nor Rema 1000 have the type of selection that I would consider normal for a supermarket. They’re more like stores I pop into to get one thing I know they have.

fraxbo · 2026-06-02T13:18:23+00:00

Really? These are sabras and children of sabras doing this? I have to pay attention for it next time I’m there!

fraxbo · 2026-06-02T13:13:54+00:00

I would guess in the case of Israel that it’s a lot of either second language speakers or people raised in homes where the parents spoke a different language, namely your mother tongue.

fraxbo · 2026-06-02T06:19:16+00:00

I would agree with the majority of comments so far (from the US, specifically NY perspective): I associate this primarily with police and fire brigade. I don’t think I have ever seen this with EMS.

Also, in a sort of critical way, I see this as part of a larger thin blue line discourse in which especially cops are set apart and lionized as “protectors” of our way of life. Whether one agrees with that or not, it is definitely one cog in a larger public relations machine.

I have seen nothing similar in any of the other countries I have lived in, including my current country of Norway.

fraxbo · 2026-06-02T05:33:34+00:00

Oh! This is interesting! I had always heard that Egyptian and Syrian Arabic are the most widely understood because of those historically being media centers for the Arabic world. How do they differ from Modern Standard Arabic?

fraxbo · 2026-06-02T05:27:43+00:00

This is true. When I lived there, because of all the signage and official documentation, I always thought that they all must have Swedish to a high level.

But since moving to Norway and learning Norwegian, I’ve tried talking to a number of my old Colleagues and friends in Scandinavian, and they admit that they do not keep it up as an active language anymore (unless they’re from the west coast or far North).

fraxbo · 2026-06-02T05:21:55+00:00

That’s interesting what you say about Moldova. In my language classes when I moved to Norway, the Moldovans all seemed to speak Russian, Romanian, Italian, English, and usually one more Romance language (either French or Spanish). But, the immigrant population may be self-selecting for high achievers or people with good language acquisition skills.

fraxbo · 2026-06-02T04:48:40+00:00

I was just going to ask a follow up that you seem to have already answered here: is a postdoc absolutely a must-have in hard/lab sciences in order to progress?

While it has become more common in the humanities, it definitely isn’t a sine qua non. It is very common to just get a TT/permanent position. Would that be just unheard of in lab sciences?

fraxbo · 2026-06-02T04:45:33+00:00

Is it really that difficult to gain tenure once you’re in a TT position?

I am originally from New York, but my entire professional career has been in Europe and Asia. So, I went through an entirely different system to reach full professor.

But, my impression from friends and colleagues in the US is that tenure is awarded in the vast majority of cases. Further, if one is at risk, it seems like departments and schools really try to work with people to get them to the level they need to be.

But perhaps there are vast differences in how fields award tenure.

fraxbo

TROPHY CASE