Canada, Australia, and New Zealand were all British colonies with similar histories of European settlement. All three had Indigenous populations before British settlers arrived, followed by waves of immigration from Britain and other parts of Europe. So why does Canada grant birthright citizenship, while Australia and New Zealand generally don’t?

In 1990, public debt in both countries was around 35% of GDP. By 2000, it was roughly 60% in France and a little below that in Switzerland.

By 2024, the gap had widened considerably. France's public debt stood at 113.1% of GDP, compared with 37.5% in Switzerland.

What explains such a different trajectory between two countries that started from fairly similar debt levels?

Growing up, I remember tonsil removal being treated almost like a normal childhood milestone. There were stories about getting ice cream afterward, and people would casually ask whether you still had your tonsils. My mom even remembers all her siblings having theirs removed.

In the US, tonsillectomy was once one of the most commonly performed surgeries, especially among children. Its popularity later declined, although the procedure is still performed today for certain conditions. How did removing children's tonsils become so common in the first place, and what changed over time?

While visiting Jeju Island in South Korea, I saw tall columns of volcanic rock packed closely together along the coast. Many had roughly six sides, but their sizes and outlines varied, and the pattern was not perfectly uniform. The columns seemed to follow a recognizable geometric pattern without actually being identical. What explains both the prevalence of six-sided columns and the variation in their shapes?

While watching YouTubers travel around China, I noticed how widespread QR code payments are. From restaurants to street vendors, it seems like almost anything can be paid for by scanning a QR code. Their excitement when they successfully used Alipay to buy subway tickets, along with how novel this payment experience felt to me, really sparked my curiosity about how mobile payments developed differently in different places.

Even small businesses in China can accept digital payments without needing a card terminal. In the US, people use mobile payments too, but paying by card or using Apple Pay seems much more common than scanning a merchant's QR code.

Both approaches let people pay without cash, but they rely on different systems. I'm curious why these two markets ended up favoring such different approaches. Is it mainly because each country already had different payment infrastructure, because merchants and consumers have different incentives, or something else?

I’m genuinely curious why some people on Reddit seem to have an issue with users who post frequently or have high karma.

I post things because I genuinely enjoy them and want to share my interests with others. I don’t care about karma or collecting internet points. I just want to be myself and enjoy the communities I’m part of.

However, a few commenters on my posts have gone through my profile and called me a “karma farmer” simply because I post a lot. It feels weird to have people judge my intentions based on my activity.

Is posting frequently really such a bad thing, even when you’re just sharing content you love? Why do some people care so much about other users’ karma or post history?

I’m not trying to argue with anyone. I just want to understand why this happens and be able to enjoy Reddit without feeling judged for being active.

In much of continental Europe, exterior shutters are a routine part of residential windows. They can provide blackout, solar shading, privacy, and sometimes security. But in the US, even in places like Phoenix or Las Vegas, window coverings are usually installed inside the glass, such as blinds or shades.

Why did these two places end up with such different defaults for controlling sunlight through windows?

On several major policy issues, prominent figures on the right openly reject established expert consensus with a sense of pride or defiance rather than apology. A few obvious examples include: framing climate data as an ideological tool designed to restrict personal freedom rather than a physical reality, challenging certified election results without producing court-admissible evidence and rejecting official epidemiological guidelines and medical institutions. How do political scientists or historians explain this shift from traditional conservatism, which historically valued order and institutional stability, to this modern posture of anti-institutionalism?

Babylonian scribes pressed contracts, receipts and letters into clay, and some of those tablets are still readable thousands of years later. Meanwhile, some files stored on floppy disks, magnetic tape and early hard drives from the 1980s and 1990s have become difficult or impossible to access, either because the media degraded or because the hardware and software needed to read them became obsolete.

What makes the difference between a record that remains readable for thousands of years and one that becomes difficult to access after only a few decades?

Recent PISA research and the ongoing debate over statistical patterns and IQ test differences make the question richer, not simpler. One interesting marker comes from a 2022 study by Dunatchik and Park looking at how American high schoolers ages 15 to 19 spend their time. In-class workload was roughly similar across groups, 231 to 249 minutes a day. Homework time, though, differed by multiples. Asian students averaged 2 hours 14 minutes a day on homework, 2.4 times more than white students at 56 minutes, 2.7 times more than Hispanic students at 50 minutes, and 3.6 times more than Black students at 37 minutes. Add test prep and academic clubs, and total study time for Asian teens reached 6 hours 36 minutes a day, compared with 4.5 to 5 hours for other groups. What is really driving these patterns? How much comes from basic discipline, family attitudes, and academic diligence? How much from school environments, peer norms, immigration selection, resources, expectations, or the way time itself is organized and valued? 

Where does IQ fit, and where does it not? What do PISA patterns show across countries, and what do they hide?

The US has more than $30 trillion in federal debt, yet the dollar still accounts for more than half of global official foreign exchange reserves. It is widely used in international trade and finance, while US Treasury securities are held around the world. High government debt and a widely trusted currency can seem like an unusual combination. So what keeps the dollar at the center of the global financial system?

Cannibal literally was coined by him when the Caribs ate his men left behind

Dutch has a really striking habit of using diseases as insults. Kanker (cancer) is one of the most recognizable examples, but words for diseases like typhus, cholera, tuberculosis and smallpox have also found their way into Dutch profanity.

Why did diseases become such powerful swear words in Dutch, and why is cancer considered one of the strongest ones?

Do we need the bot that many times

Orginal post for anyone wondering: https://www.reddit.com/r/doors_roblox/comments/1wzw5qt/hey_its_me_its_ransomity/

I was in an airport restroom last week and noticed I could see the other person's shoes under the stall. In Europe, most stalls I've used go nearly to the floor, so this feels like a genuinely American choice rather than a universal one. Intuitively, floor-to-ceiling feels like the obvious design more privacy, nothing to see through. What makes the gap "better" for the US specifically?

Genuine question, and I’m not trying to start a political argument here.

I’ve noticed that some conservatives seem willing to acknowledge good things about Obama or Biden, even if they strongly disagree with their politics. But when it comes to Trump, it sometimes feels like even acknowledging one positive thing is seen as supporting everything he does.

I’m not saying Trump is above criticism, or that anyone should ignore the things they disagree with. I just think it should be possible to recognize a good decision, policy, or achievement regardless of which party the president belongs to.

So I’m curious: why do you think it’s so difficult for some liberals to give Trump credit where they think it might be deserved? Is it because of his personality, his rhetoric, his policies, or something else?

And to be fair, do you think conservatives are equally willing to give credit to Democratic presidents, or am I seeing things through a bit of a bias myself?

I’d genuinely like to hear different perspectives.

A few generations ago, buying a home on one ordinary income was more common in many wealthy countries. Today, two working adults can still find homeownership difficult, especially in major cities. At the same time, homes are generally larger and jobs are more productive than they were decades ago. Across many developed economies, house prices have also risen faster than incomes over long periods. If people are working more and living in economies that produce more, what changed in the relationship between income and housing?

The US had more than five million farms in 1950. By 1982, that number had fallen to about 2.2 million. The decline had already been underway for decades, but the number of farms continued falling through the 1970s, while the farm crisis of the 1980s brought another major disruption to rural America.

What made it possible for so many farms to remain viable in earlier decades, and what changed by the 1970s and 1980s?

in my family, they despise fake cheese, except me of course, like they won’t eat it on anything. they only like real cheese which in i respect, but i find it gross in my opinion, the only time it tastes good is when shredded.

People still cook with cast iron skillets that are a century old. The iron itself can last for generations, and the cooking surface can be cleaned and reseasoned when it wears down. Nonstick pans work differently because their cooking surface depends on a coating that can wear, scratch, or peel over time.

What I find interesting is that the cast iron surface can be maintained or rebuilt by the owner, while a damaged nonstick coating generally cannot be restored at home.What actually determines how long these two types of pans remain usable?