this post was submitted on 26 Aug 2025
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Science Memes

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[–] Catoblepas@piefed.blahaj.zone 41 points 2 days ago (3 children)

Even if you think height divided by two, why even describe it that way? Giraffes are tall, but not so unfathomably tall that something half its size is incomprehensible. That’s 7-9ish feet. You couldn’t say the size of Andre the Giant?

[–] Lumidaub@feddit.org 19 points 2 days ago (1 children)

The Youth Today don't know who that is. Then again, do they know how large a giraffe is? We may never know.

[–] logicbomb@lemmy.world 37 points 2 days ago (2 children)

Then again, do they know how large a giraffe is?

Just today, I learned a handy way of visualizing the size of a giraffe. If you took that asteroid that struck off the coast of Iceland, and made a copy of it and put the two of them together, that's about the size of a giraffe.

[–] Lumidaub@feddit.org 16 points 2 days ago

If that doesn't get you some Nobel prize, I don't know what will.

[–] mushroommunk@lemmy.today 10 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Sorry, I need that in dishwashers or ping pong balls

[–] xylol@leminal.space 6 points 2 days ago

I think you just need to translate everything to bananas then go in from there

[–] Okokimup@lemmy.world 9 points 2 days ago (1 children)
[–] Catoblepas@piefed.blahaj.zone 2 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Sorry, I don’t get the reference and the Wikipedia page didn’t help!

[–] FearfulSalad@ttrpg.network 12 points 2 days ago (1 children)

In his show Taskmaster he is well known for both writing tasks and making jokes through intentionally obtuse language and uncommon phrasing. Frequently the "obvious" interpretation of a task turns out to be non-obvious, or the answer to a riddle is this kind of nondeterministic situation that trips up the contestants and makes for better funny.

Which is to say, the author of the headline is a troll, and did it internationally to bait this very kind of conversation. You won't know which way they sliced the giraffe unless you read the entire thing! Of course, after you do, you still won't know.

[–] Catoblepas@piefed.blahaj.zone 2 points 2 days ago (2 children)

Ah, no wonder the Wikipedia page didn’t help… the top result when I searched was for a cult leader named Alex Horn. Thanks for the explanation!

[–] Okokimup@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

The above explanation is correct, but specifically, he uses weird measurements. Like if a task involves counting a distance, he won't use something reasonable like meters, but how many rubber ducks long.

[–] ohulancutash@feddit.uk 6 points 2 days ago

They meant Alex Horne

[–] marcos@lemmy.world 8 points 2 days ago (1 children)

People usually measure asteroids by mass (but then, those people are already abnormal, so who knows?), if so, it's something around the size of a cow.

Or maybe they could use metric...

[–] cute_noker@feddit.dk 5 points 2 days ago (1 children)

A big rock, maybe this is the appropriate time to use stone

[–] marcos@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago

How many stones does a big rock weight?