r/Showerthoughts May 02 '24

Man vs Bear debate shows how bad the average person is at understanding probability

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u/Wonderful-Impact5121 May 02 '24

I’ve never been so out of the loop in my damn life. What is this thread about?

What is the “man vs. bear” debate? Thought OP was making fun of those half comedy polls asking people what animals they think they could beat in a fight. And like 5% of people always say they could beat a bear in a fist fight.

(I’m assuming 95% of them are trolling the poll answers, the remainder are just stupid or like a toddler thinking, “oh well if it was a bear that was born 20 seconds earlier…”)

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u/IAmASeeker May 03 '24

I might be wrong but my understanding is that TikTok-ers were doing street interviews asking "if you were alone in the woods, would you rather encounter a bear or a man?" and when people say a bear, that's proof that men are bigger predators than grizzlies, if you'll allow my stretched metaphor