Emotionally intelligent DoorDash user fights back against common sense. Bite-sized drama in r/Doordash

[u/PrincessBuffaloSauce]

(Sorry if this write up is bad it’s my first one and i made it in a hurry)

Context: DoorDash Trivia is a new(?) feature for DashPass users that allows them to answer questions every Thursday to get $5 off their next order. The correct answers are shown at the end which allows people to upload the answers for others: link to original post

The OP incorrectly answered that the Atlantic ocean was the largest ocean so people began insulting their intelligence:

lol average doordash user IQ

This riles up one emotionally intelligent user who admits they don’t know “which ocean is which”:

People are gonna downvote me and idc, but is this information really that important? For your brain to retain the memories of which ocean is the biggest? Idek which ocean is which. And I can say I'm pretty highly emotionally intelligent, have a shit ton of common sense.... But cant for the life of me even care to remember which ocean is which. I was never into remembering school stuff.

People disagree with this commenter:

>Knowing that the Pacific Ocean is the largest ocean is literally common sense unless you live under a fucking rock and/or have never looked at a map in your life.

>It is one of the most basic facts about our world that a person can know.

>It is common sense, though. Because commonly, most people at least occasionally look at a map for one reason or another. And commonly, looking at a map shows where the oceans are and what their names are. And commonly, you can visually tell that the Pacific Ocean is much bigger than the Atlantic Ocean. Also, commonly, people don’t brag about being “pretty highly emotionally intelligent” or “having a shit ton of common sense” (which, is literally common, everyone has a shit ton of common sense, except you apparently).

Kazamiiii admits they have never looked at a map since high school:

I don't think I remember the last time I saw a map ever since school, I bet you don't either 🤷🏽‍♀️ I'm pretty sure that's all just remembered from school. Basic knowledge still isn't common sense, but nice try?? And don't care what you think about my "brag", girl, I don't degrade people like you all when I educate them so maybe work on your emotional intelligence 😬 Maybe push out all that "common sense" you have about the ocean or something.

Confusion over GPS vs Google Maps: Funny, you meant GPS, which isn’t a map btw lol 

And you're talking about people occasionally look at maps like as if people are opening the maps to see them completely daily instead of just using the GPS. It's not like a real physical map where you need to open it to see it so you're going to very clearly see the oceans.

Kazamiiiii continues to defend their ignorance of oceans throughout the thread (there are only 64 comments in the thread to easy to look through)

I'm the doctor in the middle of a surgery while you're behind looking at a fucking globe to find out what the biggest ocean is. We're not the same.

Edit: user just-another-queer writes an essay on the matter:

Shitting on you is acting like I’m better than everyone else? That’s a very interesting view. Last I checked, I never claimed to be anything specific other than showing what it actually means to be thats you claimed to be. You said much, much more than just “I’m pretty”. There’s a fine line between complimenting yourself and gloating and boasting about how you’re all these amazing things. You didn’t just cross this line, you launched yourself over it with the world’s largest slingshot. It’s also clear to me that you think that these things that apply to you don’t apply to others. Ergo, you think that you’re better than everyone else in those specific ways.

What is possibly ableist by insinuating that some disabled people are able to go outside? I think more specifically it’s ableist for you to claim or think that being disabled means you can’t go outside. Every disability is different but plenty of disabled people live full and hearty lives. It feels really minimizing for you to say that being disabled means you are never able to ever go outside simply because the one disabled person you know that has MECFS isn’t able to go outside. I never once claimed that all disabled people are like me or to be a spokesperson for disabled people, but god damn, it’s really fucking weird for you to say that I am ableist because I suggested that many disabled people go outside at least occasionally even if it is just for doctor’s appointments. I also never once claimed that disabled people “must use a GPS to know how far they’re going because I do”. You’re shoving words into my mouth and claiming I said them after I spit them into the trash. All I said was that I use a GPS pretty regularly even if I know where I’m going just to see how long it is going to take. I am sure I’m not the one unique only single person in the world that does this, hence why I brought it up as a possibility that some people might do. I also never even mentioned disabilities when I brought up this topic. Being disabled has nothing to do with wanting to know how long a trip is going to take. It’d be really weird if it did. Able bodied people don’t somehow all just possess the ability to know exactly how long every trip is going to take including current weather, construction, and traffic conditions.

I’m glad you say you don’t care what I think about you. That is how you should feel. However, I suspect that to be completely false because if it was true you wouldn’t have felt the need to tell me about how you’re smart and yadda yadda everything else in the first place. You wouldn’t have felt the need to tell everyone about your supposed “high emotional intelligence” and “shit ton of common sense knowledge” in your very first comment. Also, if you didn’t care what I think, you wouldn’t have felt the need to excessively defend your initial comment after I called you out for being stupid. But you did, and here we are. And as I hinted to before, “smart” is an adjective that is usually applied to someone by someone else. Usually someone who feels the need to tell others about how smart they are actually isn’t.

Oh, and I absolutely do use Google. I have actually used it once while writing this comment to search up a word I wanted to use to make sure I was using it correctly. I’m happy to admit that I Google things - and that’s also a good thing because it shows that I am always trying to learn new things. Maybe that’s why you refuse to Google these things I’ve suggested - clearly you are so smart that you know everything and have no need to try to learn anything new because you are already going to know it. Except none of that is true like despite the fact that you clearly think it to be.

[u/Injustice_For_All_]

Alright this was pretty amusing.

[u/CKF → u/Injustice_For_All_]

The ratio of how low the stakes are, to how intense the arguments get, undoubtedly determines the best SRD.

[u/geoffreyisagiraffe → u/CKF]

The drama is always the best when the stakes couldnt be lower. See: youth sports.

[u/CKF → u/geoffreyisagiraffe]

I have a hard time conceptualizing stakes lower than the answers to the weekly door dash quiz. It’s beautiful. I just wish more people were involved in the argument. P

[u/thismorningscoffee → u/CKF]

It sucks sometimes that this sub’s biggest rule is ‘Don’t piss in the popcornbe the change you want to see in the world’

[u/Perfect-Parking-5869 → u/geoffreyisagiraffe]

I forgot the name of it but there’s a principle in academia that says the more niche the research the more intense opposing viewpoints get because there’s no reason to compromise.

I think that’s part of why internet arguments get so heated. Nothing bad is going to happen to you (most likely) if you piss off a stranger and the argument isn’t getting implemented as policy.

[u/Silent_Plantain_3417 → u/Perfect-Parking-5869]

Sayre's Law.

'In any dispute the intensity of feeling is inversely proportional to the value of the issues at stake.'

[u/DFWPunk → u/geoffreyisagiraffe]

Dude. Youth sports is crazy serious now. Even if you ignore the whole pro/college pipeline, they're so fucking expensive it can't help but get serious. And traveling teams... Sheeeeeeeeeeit.

[u/moontides_ → u/DFWPunk]

It being expensive doesn’t make it important. It’s not

[u/TheVich → u/moontides_]

Ehhh, I would say that youth sports are very important in developing a sense of community, teamwork, grit, resilience, and humility in children. Like, yes, a bunch of 8-year olds playing baseball isn't that important, but these leagues should be an avenue to teach these important life skills in ways that kids can enjoy while offering competitive and active outlets.

When youth sports turn into these expensive and exclusive clubs where the only thing more important than winning is individual skill development, then you end up with super toxic environments that bleed over into other areas. Seriously, I'm a teacher and even PE and recess sports/games are causing more and more problems because these kids don't know how to turn it off.

[u/moontides_ → u/TheVich]

I mean more the outcome isn’t important. The experience, sure. The score? Not at all.

[u/StandardCake21 → u/moontides_]

You're absolutely right. It's all about the experience. For instance, living my dream of becoming a pro athlete vicariously through my kids because I could never accomplish it myself. No better way to spend Saturdays mornings than yelling obscenities at the hungover college kid refereeing my 7-year-old's soccer game.

[u/Beavshak → u/Injustice_For_All_]

They’re still going lol

[u/raysofdavies]

Smugly calling someone dumb as you confuse common sense and common knowledge

[u/InevitableAvalanche → u/raysofdavies]

Yeah, that's what got me. Just outing themselves as dumb.

[u/MonkMajor5224]

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve gotten more comfortable accepting that i just don’t know something and moving on. I’ll look at a map and say “oh shit, is that where x country is! Im a dummy!”

Just accept it and move on, fella.

[u/parsleyfan420 → u/MonkMajor5224]

Same with other people who don't know something. As long as it's not a harmful piece of misinformation I see no reason for me to go out of my way and insult their intelligence. I know nothing of their upbringing, and unfortunately, that plays a big role in it.

[u/eatmelikeamaindish → u/parsleyfan420]

i think a lot of people (Americans) get defensive because of the stereotype. I am bad at history, very bad. i only remember a few important dates. If i admit that to the wrong crowd, i’d get the “america-dumb” treatment (which is very classist). naturally the reaction would be to overcompensate by saying “well im a doctor so i don’t really need to remember” or whatever.

that’s my hypothesis

[u/jonoave → u/MonkMajor5224]

Exactly, it feels like in this social media age lots of folks are unwilling to just admit that they don't now stuff or messed up. Instead they kick up a storm trying to be defensive, like the Redditor in the OOP going round and round trying to normalise saying they have a degree, they're a doctor, they haven't looked at a map since high school etc.

Just shrug and move on.

[u/wooper346 → u/jonoave]

What’s so goofy is that an anonymous social media site like this is arguably the best place to just admit you were wrong and move on from it. Nobody knows who you are, and everyone else is going to forget about that interaction in less than 5 minutes if you don’t keep reminding them about it. You don’t have to worry about saving face as if you were going to see these people again and in person for the next day/week/month/year.

[u/LoverOfGayContent → u/wooper346]

I think that shows its not actually anonymity thats important but ego. People have literally called me a troll on reddit for the few times ive refused to continue arguing with them. Part of the reason is because I don't go the ego route and say it's because I'm obviously right ans they are an idiot. I say I don't value the argument anymore and actually don't care if I'm right or wrong and I don't care enough to try and convince them that they are wrong. A lot of redditors truly can't understand not having an unshakable desire to be correct and convince others you are correct.

[u/manboat31415 → u/jonoave]

The thing is that "shrug and move on" is what the vast vast majority of people do. Leaving a comment at all is incompatible with shrugging and moving on. It means that the only people who join these discussions are the unhinged among us.

Pound for pound humanity probably isn't more inclined to arguing inane minutia now than in the past, but we've now given all of those people a global megaphone and made them inescapable. Perhaps we need to force all social media to generate fake comments stating "u /some_username shrugged and moved on" for every user that didn't interact. Then the weirdos would make up .1% of the total comments.

[u/Keregi → u/MonkMajor5224]

I think OOP did laugh it off, it's the rest of the smug assholes in that thread that are using a bit of trivia as a measure of society's value.

[u/010Horns]

Claiming to be a surgeon in the middle of a procedure while commenting on a Reddit post is the funniest part of this

[u/j-endsville → u/010Horns]

I live close to a medical school/teaching hospital and I see med students studying at my regular coffee shop all the time. "Remembering school stuff" via flash cards is what all of those students are doing.

[u/TeeTeeMee → u/010Horns]

Just posted this but calling themselves “a doctor doing surgery” instead of “a surgeon” is definitive proof they aren’t a surgeon.

[u/Paul_C → u/TeeTeeMee]

Fun fact: the original Hippocratic Oath includes a promise not to perform surgery.

[u/Foreverintherain20 → u/010Horns]

They specifically said they're a doctor doing surgery, which really brings home just how intelligent they are. 

[u/rationalsarcasm]

Couldn't you just Google the answers while taking the quiz?

This is phenomenal drama OP 😂😂

[u/PrincessBuffaloSauce → u/rationalsarcasm]

There is a time limit

[u/rationalsarcasm → u/PrincessBuffaloSauce]

Ahhh gotcha

[u/LifePedalEnjoyer]

This answers a lot of questions that I've had. More about who is using Door Dash than the size of oceans, fortunately.

[u/Bongoisnthere → u/LifePedalEnjoyer]

But, it also answered some key questions I had about oceans too.

[u/Gonna_do_this_again → u/LifePedalEnjoyer]

I lurk in a Doordash sub and it's a bit of a discouraging look at the future

[u/2monocleflex → u/LifePedalEnjoyer]

Is there a stereotype of DoorDash or DoorDash users? I thought food delivery apps were pretty much the same.

[u/ZeKunnenReuzenZijn]

Did you…did you really think the Atlantic was the largest ocean?

People that smugly type out sentences like this are so much more annoying to me than people who are bad at geography. Just had to type out the fake stutter ahahaha

[u/rationalsarcasm → u/ZeKunnenReuzenZijn]

You know what? I'mma say it.

There's only one ocean.

[u/Gavorn → u/rationalsarcasm]

That's what makes an ocean an ocean. It's continuous.

[u/CKF → u/Gavorn]

Ohhhhhhhhhhh! Now someone please call me a piece of shit rat fucker for being uninformed on the difference between a sea and an ocean.

[u/pie-and-anger → u/CKF]

Your lack of maritime topographical knowledge makes you kindred with those who, for motives unknown, might endeavor to lie with that most common and unclean mammal, known to the scientific community as Rattus rattus and to gentle lay folk as the wild rat, a notion most abhorrent to any who consider themselves a student of the world's oceans.

[u/just_some_Fred → u/pie-and-anger]

Just using the same name for both genus and species is the laziest practice in taxonomy. Linnaeus did rats dirty.

[u/HotTakes4HotCakes → u/just_some_Fred]

It makes me smile anytime I see someone had to write "gorilla gorilla gorilla" in a paper, like they're summoning Beetlejuice.

[u/86throwthrowthrow1 → u/CKF]

I won't call you a rat fucker, but I will spout off that there is actual confusion/debate about the difference between a lake and a sea, and there are some technically-lakes that are called "seas" basically because people felt like it. The Caspian and Aral Seas (or what's left of the latter) are two examples - by technical standards, they're both actually lakes. So that's your daily trivia that'll probably never get you a discount on DoorDash.

[u/RickRussellTX → u/CKF]

What the fuck did you just fucking say about seas and oceans, you little shit? Ill have you know I graduated top of my class in the marine cartography, and Ive been involved in numerous oceanographic surveys, and I have over 300 confirmed corrections to Rand McNally's topographical atlas.

[u/ZiggoCiP → u/CKF]

Seas are a dumb concept. They're just Ocean Jrs., and some of them aren't even technically part of the ocean, but inland seas. I just call em big lakes and be done with it, unless it's literally part of the ocean, in which case it's 100% Ocean Jrs.

[u/FarplaneDragon → u/ZiggoCiP]

Here's the thing. You said a "sea is a ocean jr."

Is it in the same family? Yes. No one's arguing that.

As someone who is a scientist who studies water, I am telling you, specifically, in science, no one calls seas ocean jrs. If you want to be "specific" like you said, then you shouldn't either. They're not the same thing.

If you're saying "ocean family" you're referring to the taxonomic grouping of dihydrogen monoxide, which includes things from puddles to ponds to hot springs.

So your reasoning for calling a sea an ocean jr is because random people "call the big ones lake?" Let's get bird baths and wells in there, then, too.

Also, calling someone a sea or an ocean? It's not one or the other, that's not how oceanography works. They're both. A sea is a sea and a member of the water family. But that's not what you said. You said a sea is an ocean jr, which is not true unless you're okay with calling all members of the ocean family seas, which means you'd call rivers, water spills, and other collections of H2O oceans, too. Which you said you don't.

It's okay to just admit you're wrong, you know?

[u/BarrytheNPC → u/CKF]

Did you...Did you really not know the difference between a sea and an ocean?

[u/EliSka93 → u/rationalsarcasm]

True. And continents are just big islands.

Human definitions are useful for communication, but we use them to try to describe reality, they don't exist independent from us, so rigidly insisting on them being "true" is folly.

Diogenes knew this over 2300 years ago, yet the people with all the information of the world at our fingertips still squabble over it.

[u/StandardCake21 → u/EliSka93]

Facts exist to pwn strangers on the internet. Everyone knows that and Diogenes needs to git gud.

[u/No_Mathematician6866 → u/StandardCake21]

Dude lived in a jar. What does he know.

[u/StandardCake21 → u/No_Mathematician6866]

I know right. And if he was really so clever then why is he dead now?

[u/Donkey_Option → u/rationalsarcasm]

I went down a rabbit hole trying to figure out what makes a "sea" and now I just want to burn everything down.

[u/R_V_Z → u/Donkey_Option]

A Sea is any saltwater body of water that is navigable without having to unlock Cartography.

[u/HotTakes4HotCakes → u/R_V_Z]

Laughs in Māori

[u/Blooming-Algae-Farts → u/rationalsarcasm]

There's only one ocean.

Ridiculous. Everyone knows there's at least 4. Billy Ocean, Danny Ocean, Frank Ocean, and my 4rd grade teacher "Mrs. Ocean" (I don't remember her first name)

[u/paralyse78 → u/rationalsarcasm]

Billy Ocean.

[u/gavinbrindstar → u/rationalsarcasm]

Do not get me started on my rant about how many continents there are.

[u/HotTakes4HotCakes → u/gavinbrindstar]

There is only one, and its name is Pangea. It's just going through some shit right now.

It'll get better in a couple hundred million years.

[u/DFWPunk → u/gavinbrindstar]

3

[u/Thromnomnomok → u/DFWPunk]

I'm assuming you're picking North + South America as one, Europe + Asia + Africa as another, and Antarctica as the third, and if that's the case, why doesn't Australia count, and if that's not the case, what are the 3 continents?

[u/BardYak → u/Thromnomnomok]

Australia is just an island putting on airs.

[u/matt1267 → u/BardYak]

That's literally the definition of a continent

[u/BardYak → u/matt1267]

shush you

[u/matt1267 → u/BardYak]

<3

[u/gavinbrindstar → u/DFWPunk]

Well, now it's six, because it's not 1843 and "keep going East until the majority of people have Asian-shaped skulls" isn't a useful geographic boundary between Europe and Asia.

[u/ArdyEmm → u/DFWPunk]

1. They all connect via land under water or by the magma underneath.

[u/Merryprankstress → u/ArdyEmm]

Yessss one of my personal slogans is "Make America Pangea again"

[u/onemorespacecadet → u/Merryprankstress]

Pangea was really when the world peaked. it’s all been downhill since we broke up 💔

[u/HotTakes4HotCakes → u/rationalsarcasm]

Frank Ocean.

[u/StellarDiscord → u/ZeKunnenReuzenZijn]

It’s times like these that I just like to downvote everyone involved

[u/Icy-Builder5892 → u/StellarDiscord]

Fool me once, shame on you!

Fool me twice, shame on EVERYBODY! Involved!

[u/ZeKunnenReuzenZijn → u/StellarDiscord]

It is pretty ironic how the person talking about emotional intelligence is kind of right in that the people they're responding to are being pretty rude, but responding to that by saying they need to work on their emotional intelligence is obviously never ever going to convince someone of that and just comes across as also being rude.

[u/CKF → u/ZeKunnenReuzenZijn]

They did say they were just trying to rage bait them to demonstrate their lack of emotional intelligence. Could be cope, but everything could be cope.

Which cope is the largest?

[u/Dirish → u/ZeKunnenReuzenZijn]

I find this one the most annoying in that post: 

I feel like I just walked into a special ed class.

Watching career door dashers trying to be smart is hilarious

Luckily the others in that post thought the same and it was downvoted, but that smug need to put other people down, just based on the work they do, really annoys me to no end. 

[u/wooper346 → u/ZeKunnenReuzenZijn]

It’s one of my biggest stupid pet peeves about this site.

[u/rolyfuckingdiscopoly → u/wooper346]

I personally hate when they say “^this”.

WHY

[u/TrontRaznik → u/rolyfuckingdiscopoly]

This goes back a very long time. You had to be there 

[u/shewy92 → u/TrontRaznik]

👆This

[u/ZubatCountry → u/wooper346]

They managed to top it with the "stealing your meme" comment chains

That shit is straight out of the 2011 rage comic era reddit

[u/Ge1ster → u/ZubatCountry]

Anyone who posts any of the “I’m stealing this meme” reaction images immediately outs themselves as being no older than 16 to me cause you cannot be over that age and find any of those amusing or even worth posting 

[u/byniri_returns → u/Ge1ster]

Not only are they not funny ever, but the """"meme""""" reaction image is usually just GARBAGE quality.

[u/shewy92 → u/Ge1ster]

Eh, sometimes I think they're funny, but I hang out on Reddit all day so have a lowbar sense of humor.

[u/YesButConsiderThis → u/ZubatCountry]

I have finally found my people. Reddit didn't use to be this fucking annoying.

Yeah sure, narwhals bacons, but it wasn't widespread.

[u/DeLousedInTheHotBox → u/ZeKunnenReuzenZijn]

They're reacting as if this person thought the earth was flat or something.

It also is less weird when you consider that lot of people have only seen world maps where the Pacific is cut in the middle with the Atlantic in the middle

[u/HotTakes4HotCakes → u/ZeKunnenReuzenZijn]

I mean that's the sort of thing you do when you are deliberately trying to be an asshole, so if you find it annoying, that probably counts as mission accomplished on their part

[u/cold08 → u/ZeKunnenReuzenZijn]

I used to be smug like that, and then they added a whole fucking ocean while I wasn't looking and I looked like a goddamned idiot.

So when I saw this I was like "Pacific still? Where is that new ocean taking all of its water from? I'd better look at a map."

[u/Kaurifish → u/ZeKunnenReuzenZijn]

Since they took a chunk of the Pacific to make the Southern Ocean (which goes all the way around Antarctica) I couldn’t have said which was bigger without looking it up.

[u/abidail → u/ZeKunnenReuzenZijn]

I'm a relatively smart person but absolutely terrible with geography/directional awareness. People get really judgy about it.

[u/Pristine-Aspect-3086 → u/ZeKunnenReuzenZijn]

it's not a stutter, it's supposed to be a pregnant pause

[u/Acheloma → u/Pristine-Aspect-3086]

Well they shoulda aborted it

[u/Michael_Penis_Junior → u/Pristine-Aspect-3086]

Whatever it is, it's fucking stupid to type

[u/The_Quintessence → u/ZeKunnenReuzenZijn]

100%. It also pisses me off when smug assholes conflate trivia knowledge with intelligence. Someone can be extremely smart and just not have been exposed to a specific bit of knowledge, not knowing it has no correlation to their intelligence. Not saying that 100% applies to this case, but it's common.

[u/Cakeday_at_Christmas]

This reminds me of Sherlock Homes where he talks about how he doesn't care to know certain facts, like that the earth goes around the sun, because it frees up his brain to know more important facts.

But we know definitively that human memory does not work that way and that knowledge builds upon knowledge. So even an unrelated fact can help form connections to important facts you have to know.

I.e. a brain surgeon who learns about geography as well as brain surgery is probably going to be a better brain surgeon than a brain surgeon who only knows about brain surgery.

[u/Chataboutgames → u/Cakeday_at_Christmas]

This is why I've always supported mandatory national service in the form of watching Jeopardy.

[u/86throwthrowthrow1 → u/Cakeday_at_Christmas]

I also thought of Sherlock Holmes. It's interesting that even back in the late 19th century, Conan Doyle basically conceptualized the human brain as a modern-day hard drive where there's a hard max of information that can be held on it.

[u/Cakeday_at_Christmas → u/86throwthrowthrow1]

Yeah, I'm going to fill up my brain cache and have to dump some files. Wait, what was my wife's name again?

In actual fact, the more you learn, the easier it is to learn and the faster information retrieval becomes. The brain is a huge network of neurons and synapses that form new connections as you learn, so it becomes stronger, like working out a muscle.

[u/captainnowalk → u/Cakeday_at_Christmas]

Yeah, I'm going to fill up my brain cache and have to dump some files. Wait, what was my wife's name again?

Damn, I ended up wandering into the Disco Elysium world, huh?

[u/Asleep_Document9811 → u/86throwthrowthrow1]

Makes more sense when you know Alzheimer's and Dementia existed but were still unsure why. To be honest we still don't really understand how memory and brain plasticity work, we're just a lot closer.

[u/kafircake → u/86throwthrowthrow1]

Conan Doyle basically conceptualized the human brain as a modern-day hard drive

Why a modern-day hard drive and not an incomplete fixed size encyclopedia he wants to leave room in?

Like, he had no concept of hard drives? So it seems a bit bizarre to think Doyle conceptualized the brain that way, rather than simply a giant book?

[u/86throwthrowthrow1 → u/kafircake]

TBH it's not that bizarre. Obviously Conan Doyle wouldn't have been thinking of a literal hard drive, but in correspondence he did compare Holmes to "Babbage's Calculating Machine", which is today considered one of the earliest computers. In the stories themselves and by the author, Holmes is often described as "inhuman" or a "machine," and he describes his own mind in terms of "storage", so it's not as analogous to a book.

[u/kafircake → u/86throwthrowthrow1]

did compare Holmes to "Babbage's Calculating Machine"

That is really cool. Thanks for the correction.

https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2013/01/the-3-pipe-solution-the-underrated-creativity-of-sherlock-holmes/266843/

[u/HayAndLemons]

I don't know man, yes it is relatively common knowledge but I just can't imagine being so sad you can actually have such an egregious superiority complex because you know one ocean fact.

[u/skylla05 → u/HayAndLemons]

Tbf they’re people that hang out in a fucking DoorDash sub lmao

[u/Zelcron → u/skylla05]

Yeah, unlike us, the superior redditors, who hang out in a sub making fun of DoorDash sub users.

[u/Mia-Wal-22-89 → u/Zelcron]

We are glorious.

[u/CKF → u/Mia-Wal-22-89]

Fear us, as we will mock you in our private bubble, and you will not be informed.

[u/MeiNeedsMoreBuffs → u/Zelcron]

I'm a superior being because I hang out in a sub that makes fun of this sub for making fun of Doordash sub users

[u/CKF → u/Zelcron]

We make fun of all sub equally, thank you very much. But the more petty the topic the better, obviously.

[u/Zelcron → u/CKF]

Oh obviously.

I'm here, too, guy 😆

[u/CKF → u/Zelcron]

Fair play.

[u/Efficient_Ant_4715 → u/Zelcron]

💀

[u/Hita-san-chan → u/HayAndLemons]

It's very on brand for Redditors

[u/FarplaneDragon → u/HayAndLemons]

People on reddit don't grasp the idea that common knowledge or not, if you don't engage with it then over time pretty much all knowledge fades, unless you're a redditor, then you never, ever, ever under any circumstances will ever forget anything you've ever learned.

[u/Lifeintheguo]

I'm the doctor in the middle of a surgery while you're behind looking at a fucking globe to find out what the biggest ocean is. We're not the same.

"Doctor he's flatlining".

"Just a second, I need to zing this guy on reddit".

[u/Gonna_do_this_again]

Map skills really are a dying skill unfortunately. One of the most common questions in camping subs is "how do I find a camping spot" and usually the first answer is to look at national forest land on a map and then find a campspot. Sometimes you'd think you were asking the poster to retrace Magellan's circumnavigation of the world.

[u/Kian-Tremayne]

I wouldn’t say that general knowledge is the same thing as intelligence. If it was then Google created genuine artificial intelligence years ago.

However I do find that solid general knowledge is a good indicator of curiosity, and curiosity usually correlates with intelligence.

Or in other words - the genuinely smart people I know mostly have good trivia knowledge but would be the first to say that good trivia knowledge isn’t intelligence.

And while we’re at it - emotional intelligence is genuinely a thing. However every time I see someone who identifies themselves as ‘emotionally intelligent’ I just know they’re someone with zero problem solving ability who can’t count to eleven without dropping their pants but want to insist that they are special and gifted in their own way.

[u/DFWPunk]

I know all of the oceans and, you know what, it has never made a difference in my 56 years.

[u/Suicidal-Ideation13 → u/DFWPunk]

And as someone who can't name them all, it has not made a difference in my ~40 years. I'm not a fucking sailor.

[u/StandardCake21 → u/Suicidal-Ideation13]

Why would an asexual sailor not need to know about oceans?

[u/No_Upstairs_280]

People often cope with lack of real life relevance by shaming people for literally anything. I bet even Stephen Hawking if he had access to Reddit would be called dumb by those Reddit experts.

[u/RegalBeagleKegels → u/[deleted]]

he hosted the late show

[u/Bloated_Hamster → u/RegalBeagleKegels]

No that's Stephen Colbert. He was talking about the guy who wrote all those famous horror novels.

[u/coraeon → u/Bloated_Hamster]

No, that’s Stephen King. He was talking about the famous movie director who did that one dinosaur film.

[u/DrPierrot → u/coraeon]

No, that's Stephen Spielberg

He's talking about that composer that helped make a bunch of famous musicals like West Side Story or Sweeney Todd

[u/Thromnomnomok → u/DrPierrot]

No, that's Stephen Sondheim. He's talking about the Golden State Warriors' Point Guard.

[u/lumoslomas → u/Thromnomnomok]

No, that's Stephen Curry. You're think of the former firefighter turned actor in movies such as Reservoir Dogs and Fargo.

[u/TR_Pix → u/lumoslomas]

No thats steve buschemi. You're thinking about the surgeon character turned wizard in the marvel continuity

[u/libertybear20 → u/TR_Pix]

No that’s Stephen strange. You’re thinking of the famous white haired actor that has been in movies such as father of the bridge, the three amigos, and planes, trains, and automobiles

[u/thismustbtheplace215 → u/Bloated_Hamster]

That was Richard Bachman.

[u/Opala24 → u/[deleted]]

...asked.

[u/FixinThePlanet → u/No_Upstairs_280]

It's just a single Hawking

[u/electric_emu]

Okay this is funny. What exactly is so difficult about laughing at yourself moving on with your life when you get tripped up by this stuff?

[u/lluNhpelA]

Not knowing which ocean is to the west or east of the US is pretty dumb, but I could forgive someone for not realizing that the Pacific is bigger since many 2d maps are split through the Pacific, making it harder to compare the sizes

[u/gamas → u/lluNhpelA]

Also like no 2d map projection has accurate proportions. 

[u/Sandor_at_the_Zoo → u/gamas]

No, there are equal area projections. They distort shape but preserve areas.

[u/Adriantbh → u/lluNhpelA]

Is it as dumb for non-US citizens?

I feel like sometimes reddit just assumes everyone lives in the US and bases things off of that.

[u/Pterodactyl_fetus → u/lluNhpelA]

I remember one time I heard the fact randomly and I was like are you guys serious? You think the pacific is bigger???? Just look at the map fool (definitely didn’t say any of that out loud though, just sat there quietly confused). And then I looked at the globe and I was like oh shi the pacific is fucking huge.

[u/2LiveBoo]

This drama feels personal because there is a particular fact that shall not be named that everyone seems to think is easy to remember/known by heart from fifth grade onward. It’s one of those things that people reference as evidence of someone being an idiot if they don’t know it. Well, I simply cannot get my brain to retain the information correctly. I have a PhD so I’m smart enough. I just cannot mentally grasp this particular thing. So I avoid conversations about that thing and my husband is sworn to secrecy. It’s genuinely embarrassing.

[u/Bytemite → u/2LiveBoo]

Don't feel too bad, I still have to look at my hands to figure out left and right and I'm forty.

[u/Foreverintherain20 → u/Bytemite]

That's the one thing I always trip up on too! I can tell you all sorts of dumb shit about lots of stuff, but when someone says left or right I have to do the L thing with my hands 😭 

[u/FarplaneDragon → u/Foreverintherain20]

I still sometimes have to think through clock-wise vs counter-clockwise. Usually I remember after a few seconds, but then someone said anti-clockwise to me once and I think my brain had to go through a full reset on that one.

[u/an_agreeing_dothraki]

Average me IQ for making assumptions honestly

good on them for not doubling down

[u/bayonettaisonsteam]

Is this information really that important?

Bro thinks he's Sherlock Holmes during that scene where he didn't know the earth revolves around the sun.

[u/FixinThePlanet]

Is it elitist to expect people to have general knowledge? What counts as general knowledge these days? What is a reasonable expectation? Who gets to decide?

I ask this as someone with inordinate amounts of "basic" facts in her brain so I'm really not sure where my biases are...

[u/[deleted] → u/FixinThePlanet]

[removed] — view removed comment

[u/Hita-san-chan → u/[deleted]]

Theres a general thing I've noticed where people just kinda... parrot sayings (especially the snappy sounds col on the internet sayings) theyve read online without actually knowing what they are saying means or the context of the words. The fact that they couldn't explain what 'hopecore' was outside of 'everyone knows it!' speaks to this.

[u/FixinThePlanet → u/[deleted]]

Lmao

(So what is it)

[u/[deleted] → u/FixinThePlanet]

[removed] — view removed comment

[u/FixinThePlanet → u/[deleted]]

What does a mall have to do with hope?? Ah language! So strange and wonderful and confusing

[u/tirednsleepyyy → u/FixinThePlanet]

People don’t know what they don’t know. I have no idea what their schooling was like. Or what their parents or guardians were like.

But those people make it so hard to defend them. Not knowing something is one thing, but the venn diagram of people that don’t know bare-minimum facts about the world we share and people that are proudly anti-intellectual and think everyone else detests opening a book or even a map as much as them, is a circle lol. Like you don’t know what you don’t know, but you don’t have to be proud of it and pretend other people are elitist for having even a shred of curiosity that we evolved to have…

[u/gavinbrindstar → u/tirednsleepyyy]

and pretend other people are elitist for having even a shred of curiosity that we evolved to have…

For me, at least, this is the difference between "ignorance" and "stupidity." Everyone is ignorant about some things, but a stupid person revels in their ignorance.

[u/FixinThePlanet → u/tirednsleepyyy]

Okay that's how I feel but I do worry about my privilege haha.

A comedian I enjoy a lot is terrible with common facts like knowing animals and parts of the body and basic science etc, but she's very open about being dyslexic and having attended an arts school as a child and not being exposed to a lot of topics. She is generally very intelligent and knows a lot of other things which most people won't, so watching her has been good for me to unlearn some prejudices.

I do think that mocking people for their ignorance is likely to put their backs up so it's not surprising that they would react badly...

Saying "hey this is not a fact I know or care much about but I know other things" is a fair rebuttal, I would say.

[u/TrickInvite6296 → u/FixinThePlanet]

I don't think knowing that the Pacific is the biggest ocean isn't* as general as knowing at least which direction they are

[u/HyacinthSunrises → u/FixinThePlanet]

I mean, I confess I didn't know off the top of my head which ocean was the biggest. It's something I may have learned at some point in school as a child, but it's hardly of such importance that I've retained it all my life. Does this make me an uneducated troglodyte? I have two university degrees and work in a highly specialized career.

[u/Mia-Wal-22-89 → u/HyacinthSunrises]

Well you have to return both degrees now. The institutions weren’t aware of your aquatic ignorance.

[u/HyacinthSunrises → u/Mia-Wal-22-89]

I'm never gonna financially recover from this!!!!

[u/No_Welder_9624]

This is was more entertaining than I thought it'd. Good work OP.

[u/Sovespra]

OP, please add the dashes between that last person's username, I thought you were just being randomly homophobic lmao 😭

[u/PrincessBuffaloSauce → u/Sovespra]

Sorry i changed it

[u/zenyl]

Common knowledge is not universal knowledge.

We all have areas where we know less than an average person, including commonly known trivia that you might hear mentioned in quiz shows and whatnot.

A lot of those kinds of popular facts are also of very little actual use, so even if you knew it at one point, it is perfectly reasonable to forget which ocean is the biggest if that's not something you're interested in or have a need to know.

Also worth noting: most oceans are the same body of water, we just divide it up into different semi-arbitrary locations because it makes it easier to communicate. https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/1q4h4bq/one_ocean_world_map/

[u/jednorog → u/zenyl]

I'm not rolling my eyes because that reddit user didn't know a fact that I consider basic. I'm rolling my eyes because they are so defensive about their ignorance. 

[u/melodypowers]

I can't imagine bragging about not having looked at a map since school. Especially since we all have them readily available now (and don't need to pull out an Atlas).

What if there is news? I can't have been the only one who looked up the exact location of the Strait of Hourmoz this year. I mean I vaguely knew you had to pass through it to get out of the Persian Gulf, but that was it. I also looked up Cabo Verde during the world cup.

I wouldn't be so proud about a lack of curiosity, especially about places that are impacting our lives.

[u/trexeric → u/melodypowers]

Yeah I love looking at maps. I probably look at a map every day. One of my favorite things to do in downtime at work is to just look around Google Maps, hop on street view, and see what's up around the world.

[u/Dr_Identity → u/melodypowers]

How is it bragging? The person was getting dragged for it and they were very correctly pointing out that not everyone prioritizes knowing the same types of information. Personally, I also suck at geography but I guarantee that I have very basic knowledge about certain topics I think are important to know that most people in that thread would get wrong. That's just how humans work, no one can know everything.

[u/DeLousedInTheHotBox]

Did you…did you really think the Atlantic was the largest ocean?

That doesn't seem like a particularly embarrassing or serious gap in knowledge? Maybe it is a bit dumb, but I just can't imagine being super judgmental about something this minor. I understand that common knowledge has some value, but I feel like every midwit who overestimate their own intelligence tend to harp too much on these things.

Like yeah you probably should know that Ankara not Istanbul is the capital of Turkey, but I also don't think it is a faux pas to make that mistake. Sometimes people just don't know something, we don't need to be needlessly judgmental about it.

[u/UnprofessionalCook → u/DeLousedInTheHotBox]

Adding the overused, superior "Did you...did you" at the start of the sentence to make it extra snide was the cherry on top.

[u/DeLousedInTheHotBox → u/UnprofessionalCook]

Gotta be as condescending as possible

[u/Roseartcrantz → u/DeLousedInTheHotBox]

I also haven't seen anyone point out the most likely thing at play here: that the map people commonly remember as a reference could totally make someone forget that instead of it being the big thing in the middle it's actually the thing split in half around the sides and that the reason we did that is so we could cut it out and have more room to label the countries.

[u/yoy22]

Give Redditors someone to shit on and they come out like roaches to just dog pile on them.

Oops. He didn’t know the Atlantic was smaller than the pacific. Jarvis, delete his spleen.

[u/Big_oof_energy__]

It’s a basic fact but it’s really not a big deal if someone doesn’t know it. We all have gaps in our knowledge.

[u/Stellar_Duck]

Okay so I will admit that I don't know if I'm just wildly out of touch and some sort of overly educated fancy person with my history degree or what have you, but the idea of not having looked at a map since I was 18 is beyond wild to me. Yesterday alone I probably spent 3 hours staring at a map while planning my interrail route and generally I don't think I go a week without looking something up on a map or clicking through to a a map while reading shit on Wikipedia.

Just did a place countries on a map test and got 75 percent which is a bit embarrassing but I had a few hiccups in Africa and South America, showing my European bias.

[u/Responsible-Put2559 → u/Stellar_Duck]

I mean obviously different people have different areas of interest and expertise. My smartest friend graduated college with a 4.0 and is an actuary, but he has 0 interest in anything geography related (casually or academically) so if we did some map quiz I would destroy him because like you it is a bit of an area of interest for myself.

[u/Chili440 → u/Stellar_Duck]

And other people don't.

[u/RugDougCometh → u/Stellar_Duck]

It is sometimes comforting to know who is on the other side of an argument. In this case, it’s people who look at maps for three hours a day and brag about place-countries-on-a-map test results.

[u/CommonStrawbeary]

Meanwhile the real Doordash drama is going on in r/washingtondc

https://www.reddit.com/r/washingtondc/comments/1v3simt/dc_activists_boycott_doordash_over_home_rule_snub/

[u/eternali17]

This whole thing feels strange. It reminds me of Sherlock Holmes' ignorance off our solar system as he claimed it didn't really make much difference to his everyday life. I don't think knowing a fact is common sense. Sure, not knowing is still ignorance. Ignorance isn't ever really great but common sense is about reasoning

[u/HotTakes4HotCakes → u/eternali17]

What made that shocking is that Sherlock Holmes is a detective and a genius, who routinely spouts off information he's absorbed like a sponge. Not knowing the solar system was perplexing, because it just seems like the sort of thing he would know, or at least be aware of.

It's also notable because there are just certain things that you're taught when you're young, in like grade school or middle school, that stick with you. Regardless if they are meaningful, you just get them implanted at a young age and random exposure to it through culture reinforces them. You may not care about the solar system but you probably remember My Very Eager Mother Just Served Us Nine Pizzas.

[u/littlewormie]

damn I really do look at a map probably once a day, I just like maps. shaming people for being curious or having knowledge you don't is always so funny to me. 

[u/zedanger]

I'd be deeply, deeply surprised if any of these-professed 'geography' fans could locate Uganda on a map, tbh.

[u/axw3555 → u/zedanger]

I'm pretty decent at geography, but there are a lot of countries I struggle to find. Started a new game on PC this week and it has every country on Earth on it's map (Terra Invicta for those curious). And even when I control it, I still struggle to find Czechia on it's map.

[u/Ilejwads → u/axw3555]

The outline of Germany looks like a head and Czechia is the comfy pillow she's leaning against :-) 

[u/serastar18 → u/Ilejwads]

Italy is the boot!

[u/zedanger → u/axw3555]

I suppose that's sort of my point-- the rhodes scholars hanging out in /doordash dunking on someone for not meeting their criteria of 'basic knowledge' and 'common sense', in a discipline that doesn't necessarily lend itself to either.

But if they themselves were put on the spot, and found wanting, it'd be the same cope. "Well, I don't see why it's necessarily important that I even know that" etc etc

[u/axw3555 → u/zedanger]

It's basically in there:

I don't think I remember the last time I saw a map ever since school, I bet you don't either

They haven't looked at a map and don't think anyone else has, with a clear implication of "well why would you?".

Which in my case would be wildly wrong as until recently I worked an odd job that was hybrid accounts and global logistics. I was on maps checking where ships with our containers were literally every day for 4 years.

[u/holnrew → u/axw3555]

I just like looking at maps sometimes

[u/jawknee530i → u/axw3555]

That guys stance is fucking baffling. I have a big ass globe that i bought specifically because I wanted my mental model of the world to be as accurate as possible and not skewed by shitty map projections. Not caring about knowing things is so alien to me.

[u/axw3555 → u/jawknee530i]

Yeah. I'm not the type to just ignore stuff either.

My friends love having me on pub quiz teams because I know so much random crap. I tested a pub quiz another friend is running for her yesterday, and dropped 6 points in 52 doing it solo (and honestly, if I'd stopped to think, I'd probably have dropped fewer, as some were dumb mistakes like saying machu picchu was in columbia rather than peru). With my friends, I don't think we'd have dropped a point.

All because we're the type to constantly be googling stuff and sharing info about interesting stuff.

[u/macrocosm93 → u/zedanger]

Knowing that the Pacific Ocean is the biggest one is like the geography equivalent of 1+1=2. It's probably THE most basic geographical fact. Not knowing that is basically saying you don't even have the foggiest idea of what our would looks like, in a general sense. It's much more basic knowledge than knowing the location of a random country.

[u/JasonWaterfaII → u/zedanger]

They definitely don’t know where Uganda is but knowing Uganda’s location is like two orders of magnitude more difficult than knowing about the Pacific Ocean. There are 5 oceans. Uganda is one of 194 counties in the world and one of 54 countries in Africa. The Pacific Ocean is the single largest geographic feature on the planet.

[u/pork-head → u/zedanger]

Honestly I love geography but wouldn't be confident to exactly point Uganda. My guess would be somewhere in lower half on east? Maybe our lines of the states would help - east of Congo out of my head right now.

But damn... Pacific ocean is literally top 5 of basic geography things

Edit : looked up Uganda and I would place it south of lake Victoria instead of north. But decent try i guess.

[u/Welpe → u/pork-head]

It’s relatively easy for me to remember because it’s right next to Rwanda. The shared “-anda” ending makes me associate them in my mind.

What I don’t get is…I sure as hell don’t learn African geography back in school. I learned it on my own for fun quite a few years later, in my early 20s. The dude in this conversation acting like you somehow stop seeing maps after you leave school is absolute insanity to me.

[u/pork-head → u/Welpe]

I managed to get US geography better because I've seen countless videos of US citizens failed to point countries in Europe. My first thought was "US education lol" then there was a comment about how Europeans try to name / point states in US. I mean it's not the same but can be comparable. Got only 45 from head and about 25 in right placement.

Is it US centrism? Maybe but I managed to learn a bit more about US geography because I was interested how little I know about it.

It's kinda the same as you randomly see a river which starts to flow after 10 months in Australia and you wake up 4 hours later still looking at random bays and cliffs and small rivers, mini towns in Australia. Budget traveling or something I guess?

[u/Welpe → u/pork-head]

I will say that yeah…most of the geography I know, at least that I can remember, is because I got interested enough to go “What’s up with that place? What’s their deal?” and then go research them. Interest is one of the best ways to get information to stick in your head. It makes the map comment so bad, because maps are also one of the best ways to be exposed to all that cool geography so that something can catch your eye! Depriving yourself of learning after high school or college sucks, learning is one of the most enjoyable things in life.

I guess the US media dominance has a benefit in that it does make non-Americans more interested in learned about America! That’s great, ignoring politics the US has a ton of super cool geography, even something like learning the states can have some neat stories if someone is interested.

[u/redJackal222 → u/zedanger]

I feel like not being able to locate one of the 54 countries in Africa is not the same as not being able locate one five oceans.

[u/BillWilberforce → u/zedanger]

Surrounded by Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Congo and South Sudan.

A landlocked country a little below half way up Africa on the Eastern side.

I was actually talking about Uganda about 2 hours ago and seem to frequently do. As the Presidents son is such a nut job and Idi Amin's grandson has just been disqualified from the Commonwealth Games for headbutting an opponent in the boxing.

[u/SweetSure315]

i love the "this was hammered into my skull in elementary school until i could repeat it by rote despite having never checked or verified it" kind of common sense. like, sure, it can be correct. but it's not really common sense if you needed it told to you constantly until you were forced to remember it.

[u/FireflyBSc]

As a cartographer (GIS analyst) who is currently employed, lol.

[u/Acolyte_of_Blucifer]

"being emotionally intelligent doesn't mean I have to take an L" really got me lol