At work we somehow landed on the topic of how many holes a human has, which then evolved into a heated discussion on the classic question of how many holes does a straw have.

I think it’s two, but some people are convinced that it’s one, which I just don’t understand. What are your thoughts?

  • ℕ𝕖𝕞𝕠
    link
    fedilink
    41 year ago

    A regular straw has zero holes. The central cavity, through which beverages flow, is not part of the straw, and hence it’s endpoints are not holes in the straw.

      • ℕ𝕖𝕞𝕠
        link
        fedilink
        -31 year ago

        Doughnuts don’t have holes, “donutholes” notwithstanding. A doughnut is a torus. If you poke through the side of a doughnut, then it has a hole.

          • ℕ𝕖𝕞𝕠
            link
            fedilink
            21 year ago

            Sure, but it’s a pancake with a hole in it. Pancakes ought to be disks (which is, topologically, a squashed sphere).

            If you put a hole in a doughnut it is no longer a torus. A hole deforms the manifold of an object.

      • @SaakoPaahtaa
        link
        -151 year ago

        Just realized humans are topological donuts

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          11 year ago

          You guys are all getting down voted and this misses out on the pure entertainment value of these comments

        • silly goose meekah
          link
          1
          edit-2
          1 year ago

          Almost. First you need to choose the minimum size of a hole. If you define a hole as something just a bit larger than skin pores, a human has 7 holes. Even when defining a hole as something around 1cm, you have at least 3 holes (your nostrils, mouth and anus share one cavity).

    • silly goose meekah
      link
      111 year ago

      by that logic, holes do not exist. holes are by definition not part of the material.

      • ℕ𝕖𝕞𝕠
        link
        fedilink
        01 year ago

        But they are present where you’d expect the material of the object. No one expects a straw to be a solid cylinder, ergo, the central cavity is not a hole.

        • silly goose meekah
          link
          7
          edit-2
          1 year ago

          That’s not how it works. It’s pretty unanimously understood that a donut has a hole, yet nobody expects material to be there, even though there are donuts without holes.

          There are no straws without a hole. A straw without a hole is a stick. The hole is an integral part of the straw.

        • @PopularUsername
          link
          -1
          edit-2
          1 year ago

          I see, so like, if it identifies as a hole it’s not a hole? So a cheese grater has no holes. But if I jam a screwdriver through the cheese grater, now it has a hole? What if I like the new hole and want to consider it a part of the cheese grater? Do we hold a vote on which hole identifies as a property of the object? Or do objects self-identify? I don’t speak cheese grater, this is going to get difficult.