[HN Gopher] Largest island in a lake on an island in a lake on a...
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Largest island in a lake on an island in a lake on an island (2007)
Author : thunderbong
Score : 565 points
Date : 2023-04-14 08:38 UTC (14 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.elbruz.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.elbruz.org)
| ftxbro wrote:
| is this the 'steve buscemi worked as a firefighter on 9/11' of
| hacker news
| eesmith wrote:
| This 2016 posting is outdated.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recursive_islands_and_lakes points
| out:
|
| "Until 2020,[15] Vulcan Point was an island that existed in Main
| Crater Lake on Volcano Island in Lake Taal on Luzon in the
| Philippines.[16] Main Crater Lake evaporated during the 2020 Taal
| Volcano eruption,[15] but the water in Taal Lake has returned and
| has a new island. Vulcan Point became a peninsula"
|
| Wikipedia's sole entry for "Islands in lakes on islands in lakes
| on islands in lakes" is
| https://geohack.toolforge.org/geohack.php?pagename=Recursive... ,
| commenting also that "Moose Boulder" - another contention - was
| found in 2020 to be a hoax.
| xbmcuser wrote:
| wow no wonder I was curious if it would be visible on google
| earth
|
| https://www.google.com/maps/@14.0091737,120.9958504,179m/dat...
| fwlr wrote:
| The article states that Greenland is the largest island. This may
| conflict with a common belief that Australia is an island; as an
| Australian, allow me to explain (it's actually quite
| interesting!)
|
| Australia is a continent, so it cannot be an island by
| definition, as islands are defined as 1. completely surrounded by
| water, and 2. smaller than continents. It may seem like a silly
| technical objection at first, but it's actually necessary to
| stipulate that continents cannot be islands, as otherwise the
| largest island would be the Americas, or perhaps mainland Asia +
| Africa + Europe.
|
| Perhaps the other reason Australia _seems like_ an island (while
| eg the Americas does not) is that it looks mostly convex on a
| global map. Unfortunately, we can't make use of this intuition in
| a formal way because of the coastline paradox.
| stickfigure wrote:
| > Australia is a continent
|
| Or is it King of the Islands?
|
| CGP Grey: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3uBcq1x7P34
| rags2riches wrote:
| I used to think continents and seabed were the same. If you
| were to add more sea there would be more seabed, less
| continents. Remove the water and all that's left is a single
| continent.
|
| But that's not even close. For starters, the continents are
| ancient. The seabed, the crust between the continents, is in a
| constant process of renewal. The age of the seabed is measured
| in millions of years, not billions.
| chii wrote:
| > Australia is a continent, so it cannot be an island by
| definition
|
| So the reason greenland being an island is due to definition
| then? Which makes the concept of an island moot, as it's driven
| via definition, rather than criteria.
| layer8 wrote:
| Countries are defined by convention as well; that doesn't
| make them a moot concept.
|
| That aside, there is actually a rather good criteria-based
| definition for continents vs. islands:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35568455
| pc86 wrote:
| What the difference between definition and criteria?
| chii wrote:
| a criteria can be applied to something to find out if it
| fits - a definition is by fiat (without the use of any
| criteria).
| hutzlibu wrote:
| "So the reason greenland being an island is due to definition
| then?"
|
| Isn't everything, including criteria?
| mahathu wrote:
| No, it's the difference between normative and descriptive
| categorizations.
| iso1631 wrote:
| The unambigious definition would be a contiguous landmass
| surrounded by water at sealevel, which would be in descending
| order of area
|
| Afro-Eurasia *
|
| Americas *
|
| Antarctica
|
| Australia landmass
|
| Greenland
|
| * This of course depending on how rivers and man-made canals
| of Suez, Panama, and other canals like Kiel, or ones linking
| rivers, are treated, there could be arguments that Suez
| should be included (no locks), but Panama shouldn't be, or
| all should be, or none should be, or Suez and Panama should
| be, etc
| bee_rider wrote:
| I've never heard of the idea that Australia might be an island
| instead of a continent. Grew up in the 90's in the US, FWIW. I
| wonder if "Australia as a continent" is an older idea?
|
| Of course people will argue endlessly about what exactly a
| continent is (can't just use geology because then Europeans
| don't get to be special), but the truth of the matter is,
| capturing Australia gets you +2 troops in Risk so it must be a
| continent.
| math_dandy wrote:
| Avoid these irritating semantics by insisting that "in a lake"
| be the final prepositional clause in any of these examples. We
| can all agree that a landmass surrounded by fresh water is an
| island, right? (And that lakes are uncontroversially fresh
| water by definition?)
| yowzadave wrote:
| > And that lakes are uncontroversially fresh water by
| definition?
|
| As someone who grew up next to the Great Salt Lake, this is
| not uncontroversial!
| math_dandy wrote:
| Point.
| grogenaut wrote:
| Why is the gsl a lake and the Salton sea a sea
| Dylan16807 wrote:
| Salton Sea is a lake.
| usrusr wrote:
| So we're safe from continents in lakes on islands? Phew.
| nuclearcookie wrote:
| In school in Belgium, we learned that Oceania is the continent
| and not Australia. So for us, would Australia then be the
| largest island after all?
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oceania
| juliangamble wrote:
| Quoting from that page:
|
| In her 1961 book The United States and the Southwest Pacific,
| American author Clinton Hartley Grattan commented that, "the
| use of the word Oceania to cover Australia, New Zealand, and
| the [Pacific] islands now has a slightly old-fashioned
| flavor."
| jefftk wrote:
| Whether it was an "old-fashioned" term in 1961 doesn't have
| much bearing on whether we should use it now, though.
| mfer wrote:
| > has a slightly old-fashioned flavor
|
| When people use things like this I try to catch it. This
| isn't a reasoned argument. It's meant to have the reader or
| hearer feel a certain way to change minds.
| yamtaddle wrote:
| Rather than reasoned, such a tip may be useful--if one
| wishes to speak or write about what one has read without
| giving an odd or unintended impression.
| bryanrasmussen wrote:
| I mean there are expressions that seem archaic and she
| remarked on it.
| atonse wrote:
| Agreed, anyway what is old-fashioned about it? And is
| that even a valid argument to not use it anymore?
| DiggyJohnson wrote:
| Why do you interpret her reporting that the term is "old-
| fashioned" as an argument that it shouldn't be used?
| She's not making an argument, just remarking on the term.
| bluGill wrote:
| Language is only useful if we all agree on a common
| meaning for it. If you use old fashioned language I may
| still recognize it, but it is still wrong: you need to
| update your language to whatever is current (this does
| change!) so that we continue to understand each other.
|
| Maybe I can't define why it is old fashioned, but if it
| is old fashioned it is wrong. I would hope that people
| who better understand the details have a better
| definition of the terms in use and could apply it, but
| all I know is your usage is old fashioned. (Note, the
| above doesn't preclude the idea that I'm wrong and the
| language is current, merely that we both need to do more
| research and should be more careful in this area
| until/unless we do!)
| Verdex wrote:
| > Language is only useful if we all agree on a common
| meaning for it.
|
| Is it possible to agree on a common meaning for language
| using the language for which we are attempting to agree
| on the common meaning? On a logical level, I think I
| reject such an idea, although I would be fascinated in an
| argument that suggests such a thing would be possible.
|
| > all agree
|
| Information theory suggests that commonly used symbols
| should be short and rare symbols should be long. Any
| subgrouping of people will encounter scenarios requiring
| different ideas to be discussed at different frequencies.
| Jargon differing amongst people is to be expected and is
| what at least I have observed. I also reject 'all agree'
| on an information theory level.
|
| > Language is only useful
|
| And finally on a personal note. I generally misunderstand
| what most people are talking about most of the time. I
| think of it in terms of being weakly immune to peer
| pressure, but the other side of the coin is that I have a
| hard time keeping up with whatever group I'm a part of.
| And vice versa, I often say things that others quite
| obviously misunderstand.
|
| However, I still find language useful. Even when there is
| no agreement on common meaning. Even when jargon
| necessarily forms differently between groups (and often
| even between individuals). Even when we try imperfectly
| to define language basing it upon itself. Using old
| fashioned language (or simply uncommonly agreed upon
| language) isn't 'still wrong' even if recognized. It is,
| I assert, the only way language can even be.
| pmarreck wrote:
| You're right. But it may still have that flavor.
| [deleted]
| lhorie wrote:
| Tasmania and Frasier are islands, which would make Australia
| more of an archipelago, I think.
| FabHK wrote:
| There are schools of thought with 4, 5, 6, or 7 continents,
| but all of them consider Australia a continent, and Oceania a
| region, at least according to Wikipedia; though "some
| geographers group the Australian continental landmass with
| other islands in the Pacific Ocean into one 'quasi-continent'
| called Oceania."
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continent#Definitions_and_appl.
| ..
| marcosdumay wrote:
| All continents include islands, but that doesn't make their
| main land body an island.
|
| Anyway, all of that is completely arbitrary, so don't expect
| it to make sense.
| fwlr wrote:
| Yes, if you grew up being told that the continent is Oceania,
| and all the people around you were also told the continent is
| Oceania, then Australia is indeed the biggest island.
| Language is fun like that.
| lexandstuff wrote:
| The definition of a continent is a continuous expanse of
| land. So technically, Australia is a continent, and Oceania
| is a region [1].
|
| It seems that parts of the world refer to regions as
| continents.
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Region
| BillinghamJ wrote:
| I wouldn't say the definition is all that clear-cut either:
| https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/continent#English
|
| > generally regarded as seven in number, _including their
| related islands_, continental shelves etc.
| OJFord wrote:
| Ok so the bulk of Great Britain is a continent, Northern
| and the Republic of Ireland form a continent, the Isle of
| Wight is a continent, ...?
|
| Or for the NA readers: the bulk of NA&SA form a single
| continent, not two, Russia and continental Europe sometimes
| join it, Hawaii is a continent, ...?
| rvba wrote:
| Something does not add up for me here. If you say that
| Australia is a continent, but Oceania a region.. then how
| is New Zealand classified? Shouldnt it count as a continent
| too? (What is probably wrong)
|
| I think all those things are quite cultural: after all
| Europe and Asia are connected, arguably with Africa too.
| Same for both Americas which could be counted as one big
| thing. On a side note does: Panama canal work as a real
| divide between both Ameican continents? Similar question
| for Suez Canal
| prennert wrote:
| "continuous expanse of land" would imply at least that any
| island is its own continent, but perhaps even that each
| bank of any river (while water is in it) would divide
| continents. So that does not seem right.
|
| Wikipedia actually contradicts you in the first two
| sentences in the "Continent" entry [0]:
|
| > A continent is any of several large geographical regions.
| Continents are generally identified by convention rather
| than any strict criteria.
|
| [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continent
| frosted-flakes wrote:
| An island is not an _expanse_ of land, and the presence
| of a river doesn 't make an expanse of land
| discontinuous.
| prennert wrote:
| Greenland and Madagascar would disagree. But yes on
| second thought, you are correct with the river.
| memsom wrote:
| The funny thing is that in other languages, you are not
| right. I thought I was remembering correctly, so I looked -
| here is what Swedish has to say:
|
| https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/V%C3%A4rldsdelar_och_kontinen
| t...
|
| So - in Swedish, "kontenent" is a "continuous expanse of
| land". But a "varldsdel" (which translates to "part of the
| world" roughly) is I guess "region". So - if you look at
| the table, "Europe" and "Asia" are both individual
| "varldsdel", but they are one "kontinent" Eurasia. This
| certainly flies in the face of what I was taught in school
| - Europe was definitely a continent, as was Asia. Also
| notice, Oceana is a "varldsdel", Australia is a
| "kontinent". But Google translates both words to
| "continent" in English, but the words are different..
| kontinent is "geographical", but varldsdel is "cultural".
|
| I think this is what causes the issue - the definition of
| the 7 traditional continents in English is not universal.
| This page seems to imply it is very dependent on where you
| live (sorry, in Swedish again):
| https://www.geoguessr.com/seterra/sv/p/hur-manga-
| varldsdelar (this is google translates version:
| https://www-geoguessr-com.translate.goog/seterra/sv/p/hur-
| ma... )
| LeifCarrotson wrote:
| If you define the continent as a continuous expanse of
| land, then the Americas and Afro-Eurasia are continents,
| albeit divided by the Panama Ithsmus, Suez Ithsmus,
| and...Ural Mountains?
|
| Panama and Suez are divided by a canal, but those are
| artificial with a floor higher than sea level. If you
| stopped maintenance on the canals for a geologic blink of
| an eye and it would return to a land bridge, but it's
| narrow...I can see arguments both ways.
|
| However, the only argument for calling Europe one continent
| and Asia a different continent is that Eurasia would be too
| big if it were a continent. Afro-Eurasia is right out!
| eesmith wrote:
| Technical point: The Suez canal is a sea-level waterway,
| and even has a slow rate of flow. There are no locks.
|
| The floor of the canal is definitely below sea level.
| There's a 1.2 m difference in sea level between the two
| ends, and the canal is 24 m deep.
|
| That said, without maintenance it would indeed revert to
| a land bridge.
| mvandermeulen wrote:
| What if I was to count to 5 instead of 3?
| madeofpalk wrote:
| "continuous expanse of land" Is United Kingdom a part of
| Europe?
| einpoklum wrote:
| Oh, you don't want to get into that discussion my
| friends. Many men have died in the context of "answering"
| that question...
| twelvechairs wrote:
| > The definition of a continent is a continuous expanse of
| land.
|
| That is both vague and by no means the only definition of a
| continent. A continent is basically defined culturally -
| different places say there are 4,5,6 or 7 continents.
|
| The closest to a good scientific definition is 'the largest
| landmass of a continental plate' (which would include
| Australia but not greenland, but then arguably India, east
| Africa, Arabia and Central America are really also on their
| own plates)
| anyonecancode wrote:
| I like having a clear definition like basing it on
| continental plates, though a map of the plates seems to
| raise its own set of questions. How small is too small of
| a plate to count? What of parts of what we call
| continents that are actually on a different plate?
|
| https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b4/Plate
| _te...
|
| I think continent, in the general usage, is really more
| of a cultural/political definition than an an objective
| standalone concept.
| scythe wrote:
| Perhaps the most challenging problem with the plate
| definition is that it would place northern Honshu and all
| of Hokkaido in North America. Treating the Caribbean,
| India and Arabia as continents is basically consistent
| with how we talk about them anyway.
| bluGill wrote:
| I wish science would come up with a better definition.
| Just like we no longer have Pluto as a planet (there were
| other definitions they considered with different results
| - the important thing is a useful definition)
| SllX wrote:
| That won't happen, largely because continents are BS
| scientifically but useful colloquially and in geography.
| Politics also uses them too, but the usefulness of that
| I'll leave as an exercise for others.
|
| If you want science, you want plate tectonics and
| geography focused around the boundaries of plates and
| volcanic science. If you want to know what a continent
| is, whatever model you were taught in school is good
| enough for government work. The important thing is to
| know what that land over yonder is if you're on a boat.
| manojlds wrote:
| Yeah then Pluto is a planet as well. We defined it more
| precisely and demoted Pluto. Continents are just not
| defined in detail.
| frosted-flakes wrote:
| I mean, Pluto is definitely still a planet in the
| cultural imagination. There can be exceptions to rules.
| Even if there are some exoplanets that resemble Pluto, we
| can still say that Pluto is a planet and those other
| nameless things aren't.
| Nevermark wrote:
| I cannot understand why the cultural understanding of
| planet wasn't respected, while still making whatever
| nuanced distinction scientists wanted.
|
| My solution would have been:
|
| _Planet_ = any standalone body in space, formed around a
| star or brown dwarf, large enough for gravity to mold it
| into a sphere, but not massive enough to enable any
| fusion. (i.e. exclude stars and brown dwarfs).
|
| Then:
|
| _Major planet_ : Planet that has cleared the
| neighborhood around its orbit. We have 8 of these.
|
| _Minor planet_ : Planet that has not cleared the
| neighborhood around its orbit. This would include Pluto,
| Ceres, and many extra-Pluto bodies.
|
| The current scientific definition is tortured. I.e. a
| "dwarf planet" is not a "planet", which is just
| unintuitive nomenclature grammatically, as well as
| violating the regular use of the word "planet".
| krzyk wrote:
| In my case (school in Poland) it was: Australia and Oceania
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| Surely that would be Antarctica?
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > In school in Belgium, we learned that Oceania is the
| continent and not Australia. So for us, would Australia then
| be the largest island after all?
|
| No, whether you call the continent "Australia" or "Oceania",
| the land mass that makes up the entirety of the mainland of
| it is, _ipso facto_ , not an island, and neither is the
| country occupying the entirety of that landmass and some
| adjacent islands (though, of course, it contains several
| islands.)
| elvis70 wrote:
| Oceania is not Australia. After the Wikipedia article:
| "Oceania is a geographical region which includes
| Australasia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia".
| [deleted]
| martincmartin wrote:
| Yes, but Australia is " the land mass that makes up the
| entirety of the mainland" of Oceania.
| SllX wrote:
| In English, Australia is just Australia. The Australian
| continent includes the Australian mainland, New Guinea
| and several islands within Australian or Indonesian
| jurisdiction.
|
| Oceania is this designation of convenience that excludes
| islands that are non-Continental and would otherwise be
| lumped in with Asia, and in addition to Australia there
| are three groupings of island territories which are
| ethnically classified as Melanesia, Micronesia and
| Polynesia.
|
| Melanesia includes New Guinea (remember, part of the
| Australian continent, separated from the country by a
| strait), and running east goes to Nauru, southeast to
| Fiji, and then west to New Caledonia which is essentially
| one of the highest altitude masses of the mostly
| submerged continent of Zealandia (the other land masses
| being New Zealand and a few islands belonging to the
| country of Australia). Melanesia also includes the
| Solomon Islands and Vanuatu.
|
| Micronesia is a region that from Palau runs east through
| the Federated States or Micronesia to Kiribati, northwest
| to the Mariana Islands (including Guam) and back down to
| Palau and is mostly in the Northern Pacific.
|
| Polynesia forms a near-triangle often referred to as the
| Polynesian Triangle with New Zealand in the Southern
| corner, Hawai'i in the Northern corner and Easter Island
| in the Eastern corner. There are too many island groups
| here for me to want to list them all, but this is
| essentially where Polynesian peoples settled.
|
| Which brings us back to Oceania. There's all these
| islands people live that if you squint your eyes a little
| look like they're close enough to Australia. Why not just
| group them all together and call them a continent? And
| from what I've gathered that's exactly what a lot of
| countries have done for a while or started to do.
| Continents are basically arbitrary BS anyway, good BS
| that serves a useful purpose colloquially but still BS;
| and it looks like to me like it's just a way of keeping
| the list of "major regions" shorter than it otherwise
| would be because between Australia also being a country
| and all of these archipelagos spread out across the
| Pacific being both low population and underdeveloped,
| nobody wants to append them to a list of supposed
| "continents" as separate entities, so Oceania it is.
|
| And if you did that, what about India? Arabia?
| Madagascar? The western portion of North America
| basically divided by the Rockies? This would start to get
| political after a while.
|
| So eh, Australia is a continent in English, but Oceania
| is a region that includes Australia. Whether the
| continent of "Australia" includes the obvious portions
| like New Guinea, well, not when I was in school, but I
| don't think that matters.
| sebastialonso wrote:
| We learned this in Chile as well, Oceania is as Asia is as
| America. Also that no country is at the same time a
| continent. Are Aussies taught that their country is the
| actual continent?
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| > Also that no country is at the same time a continent
|
| Can a continent have the same name as a country?
| coutego wrote:
| Yes. America.
|
| I know, I know. English speaking countries refer to the
| continent as "the Americas" rather than America, as the
| rest of the planet does but, then, the rest of the planet
| refers to the "United States of America" as the "US" and
| (normally) not as "America" .
|
| Now seriously, America is a given name for the whole
| continent (with Noth America and South America as its two
| subcontinents) and was never meant to be used as the name
| of any one of its 35 countries.
|
| Many in the EU are often doing the same chauvinistic
| thing, refering to themselves as "Europe" forgetting that
| there are 23 European countries that are not part of the
| EU. That case is slightly (just slightly) less annoying
| because at least is 27 EU European countries vs 23 non EU
| European countries, so at least they can claim to be the
| majority of countries. US case is one country vs. 34, so
| objectively even more absurd.
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| Synecdoche is relatively common:
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synecdoche
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| This comment seems confused. In English, "the Americas"
| isn't a continent nor are North America and South America
| "sub-continents"; rather, North America is a continent,
| South America is a continent, "the Americas" refers
| unambiguously to the collection of both continents, and
| "America" refers unambiguously to the United States of
| America (and "American" refers unambiguously to a US
| citizen). The only chauvinism occurs when speakers of
| other languages insist that the English language adopt
| their model of continents and the corresponding toponyms
| and demonyms (for example, many Spanish speakers use
| "Americano" to refer to inhabitants of the Americas, and
| since that word looks like "American" in English, many of
| these Spanish speakers believe English speakers should
| modify the meaning of "American" to mirror their
| "Americano").
|
| Using "Europe" to refer to the EU member states in
| English is different because "Europe" in English
| traditionally refers to the entire continent and
| referring to the EU as "Europe" introduces ambiguity. I
| don't think this ambiguity is a significant problem and I
| wouldn't call it "chauvinism" but perhaps I could be
| convinced otherwise.
| lhorie wrote:
| > "America" refers unambiguously to the United States of
| America
|
| When people say "Columbus discovered America", it most
| certainly is referring to the entire landmass and
| surrounding islands (he technically landed in the
| Bahamas).
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| That seems likely to be a vestige and not emblematic of a
| general pattern.
| msm_ wrote:
| By the way, one thing I always wondered? Are Canadians
| annoyed by that usage, or more or less accepted that
| they're not "American" in English? (I would especially
| appreciate if a Canadian shared their thoughts about
| this)
| lhorie wrote:
| (I'm a canadian citizen, born in South America)
|
| My two cents is US people are the ones who have an
| unusual take on the word "America". Outside the US, it's
| not very idiomatic to call the country "America", or even
| "USA". "US" is more common (and in both Spanish and
| Portuguese, it's almost always called "Estados Unidos").
|
| The term "american" is mainstream both in Canada and
| elsewhere. I imagine that's probably at least partly a
| function of "unitedstatesman" being too much of a
| mouthful. (BTW, if you think that's a ridiculous word, in
| portuguese "estadounidense" is an actual word, albeit
| with a connotation of being something a "woke" person
| might say).
| coutego wrote:
| > many Spanish speakers use "Americano" to refer to
| inhabitants of the Americas, and since that word looks
| like "American" in English, many of these Spanish
| speakers believe English speakers should modify the
| meaning of "American" to mirror their "Americano"
|
| Spanish speakers, or, rather, the Crown of Castille
| created the word "America" and "americanos" to refer to
| the new continent and their people. English speakers
| adopted the same word, but with a different meaning.
|
| Not saying that it's wrong for US people to refer to
| their country by anh word that they chose. They are free
| to do so. But it is useful, I think, to understand that
| people for other countries of America, who call
| themselves "americanos" because that's what they are, can
| be surprised to be told they are not "Americans", even
| though they are "americanos". I guess it's confusing for
| them, at the very least.
|
| Just imagine that Colombians started to call their
| country "America" and when you went there they would
| insist that you are not American ("americano"). I guess
| you would not be amused. I don't know.
|
| I'm not "americano", but European, so it doesn't really
| affect me. Just trying to give some context to better
| understand others. Peace! :-)
| coutego wrote:
| That's what I wrote, that in English speaking countries
| you refer to the whole continent as "the Americas".
|
| The name "America", though, was given to the whole "New
| World", which is what we now call "America", the
| continent. British started using the name just for what
| is now the US, so in English speaking countries, the
| usage is different nowdays. In other countries "America"
| continues to be used for the whole continent (it is still
| considered one conti nent, not two).
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amerigo_Vespucci
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continent
| frosted-flakes wrote:
| Sure, Australia the continent and country have the same
| name.
| xiande04 wrote:
| We were taught that Australia is a continent in the US as
| well. But then again, Americans are not known for their
| knowledge of geography...
| Clamchop wrote:
| Pretty sure even Americans know of islands and
| continents, even if they bin them differently. The
| distinction is fundamentally arbitrary...
| xiande04 wrote:
| Okay. If you think that, go ask a random American to
| point to Oceania on a map. Report back to me when you do.
| :)
| Clamchop wrote:
| Different goalpost. :) :) :)
| kube-system wrote:
| I was taught both in the US. The content taught in US
| schools varies by locale.
| e-v wrote:
| I don't know if you went to a French-speaking school in
| Belgium, but I was told the same thing in a French school.
| The French "continent" certainly refers to a large mass of
| land and its surrounding islands [1]. Hence, the continent is
| Oceania rather than Australia.
|
| [1] https://www.larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais/continent/
| 186...
| judge2020 wrote:
| Also "Oceania" according to ISO 3166-1
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_
| d...
| yellowapple wrote:
| That's how we learned it in middle school and beyond here
| in the US, but the Australia question boiled down to "yeah,
| technically it's an island, but are you _really_ going to
| start your conversations about Australia with a bunch of
| quibbling around islands v. continents? ".
| brewdad wrote:
| Quibbling over pedantry is what this site does best.
| late2part wrote:
| You mean arguing!
| hinkley wrote:
| SHUT YOUR FESTERING GOB, YOU TIT! YOUR TYPE MAKES ME
| PUKE!
| B1FF_PSUVM wrote:
| No, it's not. Exquisite all-Erlang front pages are also
| occasionally served.
|
| (OK, once, many years ago, but the point stands.)
| ed_elliott_asc wrote:
| Citation needed.
|
| Oh wrong site.
| ed_elliott_asc wrote:
| My children 12&9 were taught at school in the UK that
| Australia was in oceanana
| ghostDancer wrote:
| Spain, at least at my time was the same. The Continents
| were Asia, Africa, America (North and South as one) ,
| Europe, Oceania.
| ComputerGuru wrote:
| Funny. One America but no Eurasia ;)
| ghostDancer wrote:
| I'm talking how we learned 40 years ago in Spain, don't
| know if it has changed. Antarctica wasn't even included
| then.
| dorfsmay wrote:
| Then, by that definition, how is Europe, as opposed to
| Eurasia, a continent?
| panxyh wrote:
| The continents are defined geologically and not by amount
| of blue around them on a map.
| 0xffff2 wrote:
| North and South America are on different tectonic plates,
| while Europe and most of Asia are on a single plate. If
| anything, the geological definition of continents seems
| to support separate Americas and a unified Eurasia.
| panxyh wrote:
| I stand corrected then. Always assumed that the Ural lied
| on border of two plates.
| Beldin wrote:
| And to acknowledge India as a separate continent.
| TylerE wrote:
| The best argument for separating the Americas is probably
| the existence of the Darien Gap. I'm not sure there is
| more inhospitable route in a populated area anywhere in
| the world.
| [deleted]
| eesmith wrote:
| The continents are defined geographically and culturally,
| not geologically.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continent points out how
| they "are generally identified by convention rather than
| any strict criteria" and lists "several ways of
| distinguishing the continents", with the 7-continent
| model, two different 6-continent models. It also mentions
| the "four-continent model consisting of Afro-Eurasia,
| America, Antarctica, and Australia", as well as how there
| were only three discrete landmasses present during the
| Pleistocene ice ages, when the Bering Strait was instead
| land.
|
| You can see the cultural influence in:
|
| > In the English-speaking countries, geographers often
| use the term Oceania to denote a geographical region
| which includes most of the island countries and
| territories in the Pacific Ocean, as well as the
| continent of Australia.
|
| > In some non-English-speaking countries, such as China,
| Poland, and Russia, Oceania is considered a proper
| continent because their equivalent word for "continent"
| has a rather different meaning which can be interpreted
| as "a major division of land including islands" (leaning
| towards a region) rather than "land associated with a
| large landmass" (leaning towards a landmass).
|
| They are not defined by geology nor continental plates.
| For one, the word and current use is far older than our
| first glimmers of understanding plate tectonics.
| https://www.etymonline.com/word/continent says the
| meaning in the 1550s was "continuous tract of land" and
| by the 1610s became "one of the large land masses of the
| globe".
|
| FWIW, the North American plate includes some of the
| continent of Asia.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_American_Plate
| ta8903 wrote:
| No Antarctica? I was taught it was a continent (making 7
| of them) and Wikipedia confirms it being one.
| ghostDancer wrote:
| 40 years ago in Spain 5 continents only, no Antarctica,
| my guess is as no one was living there why worry about
| it. Don't know if it has changed, I'll ask my son.
| pasc1878 wrote:
| If Australia is a continent then what continent are New Zealand
| and New Guinea in?
| ezzaf wrote:
| They are not part of a continent, but simply islands (well,
| groups of islands).
|
| Some definitions would include them as part of Oceania.
| Marqin wrote:
| New Zealand is part of Zealandia continent (which nowadays is
| mostly submerged)
| schwartzworld wrote:
| > it's actually necessary to stipulate that continents cannot
| be islands, as otherwise the largest island would be the
| Americas, or perhaps mainland Asia + Africa + Europe.
|
| I don't understand. Why does considering a single continent to
| be an island also mean that you need to include groupings of
| multiple continents in that definition? Europe + Asia + Africa
| is 3 continents, not one.
| axus wrote:
| Is it transitive? Does "continent cannot be island" imply
| "island cannot be continent"? I don't even know the other
| word to describe "island cannot be a single continent, but it
| CAN be multiple continents".
|
| I guess that gets into the question: "Can a river count as
| the border of an island?". What happens if the river dries up
| sometimes?
|
| It seems people have already decided there are 7 continents,
| and will adjust the definition until it gives the result.
| munk-a wrote:
| Might I supply an alternative island definition that would help
| clear things up? Any landmass surrounded by water where you can
| acquire a Mai tai is an island - while any landmass surrounded
| by water where you are unable to acquire a Mai tai is an islet.
| More seriously - this is like the pluto debate all over again
| and it seems mostly fueled by negative perceptions of being and
| not being a thing. Can't we just settle on all distinct land-
| masses being islands and some islands just being stupidly
| large? I don't get what we stand to gain by excluding either
| three or four land masses from the island definition. So long
| as we're excluding man made canals from the definition we only
| have Afro-eurasia, the Americas, Antartica and possibly
| Australia as non-island landmasses - making an exception in a
| group of thousands? millions? of water surrounded land-masses
| to not be islands feels exceptionally useless.
|
| I humbly propose we open the consumption of Mai tais to
| everyone on earth without discrimination. If you object I
| welcome you to come to a conference I'm arranging on the island
| of Jylland.
| xg15 wrote:
| > _Unfortunately, we can't make use of this intuition in a
| formal way because of the coastline paradox._
|
| I wonder if you could create some "relaxed" definitions of
| "convex" that would be able to capture shape properties only at
| certain scales. Something like "every polygon from points which
| are between x and y meters from the coastline and at least z
| meters from each other is convex".
| fwlr wrote:
| Draw a convex polygon which satisfies the conditions
|
| 1. Every point on the edge of the polygon is in water
|
| 2. Every point on the land in question is inside the polygon
|
| And then sample some very large _n_ points uniformly
| /randomly from inside the polygon, reporting whether you hit
| land or water. The closer to 100% land your sampling gets,
| the more "convex-like" the land in question is.
|
| Basically, draw a convex bounding polygon around the land and
| ask how much of that bounding polygon does the land fill up.
| Laaas wrote:
| Continents are a flawed and made-up concept. They make no
| sense. They add absolutely no value to any discourse. I simply
| refrain from using the concept.
| fsckboy wrote:
| sounds like the best way to describe you and your feelings
| about this subject is: incontinent!
| rendaw wrote:
| I agree, in fact islands are a made up concept too. All
| landmasses on earth are surrounding water, although not
| simultaneously. There are only lakes.
| ByThyGrace wrote:
| The whole conversation will get awkward once the polar ice
| caps fully melt.
| AmVess wrote:
| We can fuse ideas and call it a Continental Island.
| belter wrote:
| It would be great if it existed at all:
| https://www.theguardian.com/technology/shortcuts/2018/apr/15...
| amelius wrote:
| If Australia is an island, then the moment someone spills a
| drop of water on Mars they are standing on an island.
| iso1631 wrote:
| The term "continent" is illdefined, but English wikipedia
| defines the Continet of Australia to comprise the country of
| Australia and the country of Papua New Guinea, as well as part
| of the country of Indonesia (Western New Guinea)
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia_(continent)
|
| This is a separate Australia to Australia the Mainland (which
| doesn't New Guinea), and separate from Australia the country
| (which includes Tasmania)
|
| Therefore I'm not convinced that "Australia is a continent, so
| it cannot be an island by definition" rules out the Australia
| Mainland.
|
| If we look at the wikipedia definition of Island
|
| "subcontinental land completely surrounded by water"
|
| And accept that "Australia the continent" comprises "Australia
| Mainland", New Guinea (both PNG and part of Indonesia), and
| nearby islands like Tasmania and Lord Howe (but not New
| Zealand), then Australia Mainland is surely subcontinental and
| completely surrounded by water.
|
| Once you leave the English speaking world though, Oceania as a
| continent comes into play, which goes back to that "definition
| of continent"
| layer8 wrote:
| Please see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island#Differentiati
| on_from_co...:
|
| _There is a widely accepted difference between islands and
| continents in terms of geology. Continents are often
| considered to be the largest landmass of a particular
| continental plate; this holds true for Australia, which sits
| on its own continental lithosphere and tectonic plate (the
| Australian Plate).
|
| By contrast, islands are usually seen as being extensions of
| the oceanic crust (e.g. volcanic islands), or as belonging to
| a continental plate containing a larger landmass (continental
| islands); the latter is the case of Greenland, which sits on
| the North American Plate._
| bee_rider wrote:
| The continental plate based definition seems to include a
| number of splits they are not widely considered continents.
| I mean I'll happily combine Europe and Asia into Eurasia,
| and India is clearly a continent, but an Arabian continent
| doesn't seem to be brought up much at all, and I've never
| heard of somebody listing "a bit of Central America" when
| talking about the continents.
| iso1631 wrote:
| Asia (Or Eurasia, or Africa/Eurasia) comprise multiple
| tectonic plates, as does America (or North/South America).
| Is the area south of the Himalayas a separate continent
| from the area north because they're on different plates?
| What continent is Iceland in? Or Japan, much of which is on
| the North American plate.
|
| There's no clear definition and there's far to much
| political and cultural meaning in the definition of a
| continent so any definition involving the term is going to
| be ambiguous.
| ezzaf wrote:
| Wouldn't this apply to other continents too? Given for
| example Vancouver Island is part of North America, then North
| America (the island, not the continent) would qualify as it
| too is sub-continental. Europe and Asia would be the only
| continents excluded by virtue of being connected by land.
| manojlds wrote:
| > as otherwise the largest island would be the Americas, or
| perhaps mainland Asia + Africa + Europe.
|
| Isn't that the point though? North America is not an island.
| Asia is not an island. If NA and SA were one, they would be an
| island, but they are not.
|
| If the point is Australia is a continent and hence not an
| island fine. But it's not because Americas will then become
| island because Americas is not a continent.
| fsckboy wrote:
| North and South America are isthmi
| munk-a wrote:
| Eurasia is just a big penisula off of the Sinai.
|
| These technical definitions are pretty awful when we get
| down to it.
| isaacremuant wrote:
| It's not "The Americas".
|
| It's America. It's a continent. It was named after Amerigo
| Vespucci.
|
| The fact that English speakers, led by the citizens of the
| United States of America, in practice claim the name America
| for themselves and want to push the point of North and South
| (never quite agreeing what north is depending on the
| political point being made), doesn't mean that there's
| objective validity to it. Just a egocentric convenience and
| the superpower influence.
| jgwil2 wrote:
| You're being very pedantic about something that's
| fundamentally arbitrary and culturally defined. What makes
| your preferred usage the correct one?
| Dylan16807 wrote:
| > Just a egocentric convenience and the superpower
| influence.
|
| This is completely wrong, unless your argument is something
| like there being only two continents. Which is fine but
| pretty far from how continents are normally defined and you
| should probably use a different word.
|
| By far the most egregious continent border is Europe vs.
| Asia, and Africa is connected to those two just as much as
| the Americas are connected.
|
| > never quite agreeing what north is depending on the
| political point being made
|
| You get the same political fussiness around every continent
| border. But the geographic boundary is pretty well decided
| to be Panama.
| anamexis wrote:
| There is no singular definition of continent. In some uses,
| the Americas are a singular continent.
|
| (One odd example is the five Olympic rings, which represent
| the "five inhabited continents": Asia, Europe, Africa,
| Australia, and the Americas.)
| manojlds wrote:
| Precisely the point that these are arbitrary definitions.
| Making a point that making Australia a island would make
| Americas also island is silly.
|
| And the ring represents Oceania and not Australia, and this
| makes Australia an island in Oceania.
| krzyk wrote:
| Well, Antarctica is bigger than Australia.
| duxup wrote:
| Make sense to me.
|
| > It may seem like a silly technical objection at first
|
| And of course, just gotta draw the line somewhere.
| CorrectHorseBat wrote:
| >otherwise the largest island would be the Americas, or perhaps
| mainland Asia + Africa + Europe.
|
| Just curious, why perhaps? the second is much bigger
| bluGill wrote:
| Africa is enough separate that you can make an argument that
| it isn't part of Asia+Europe. I can see no good reason to
| call Europe and Asia a separate continent. (I'm not sure if
| it is bigger than north+south America - it feels like it is,
| but maps can be deceiving and can't be bothered to look it
| up). Of course if Africa is not part of Asia+Europe then it
| is hard to argue America is one continent.
|
| In the end we don't have a good definition of continent
| though, so you can find plenty of weird things you can argue
| should be the definition and thus come up with a lot of
| contradictory answers.
| globular-toast wrote:
| Maybe Afroeurasia is just "land" and everything else is
| ocean, with islands.
|
| I find it funny that humans love facts like "the skin is the
| largest organ" but hate facts like "Afroeurasia is the
| largest island". I wonder why that is.
| yamtaddle wrote:
| I don't think people hate either, we just don't treat them
| as actually-true when using language. Nobody ordinarily
| means to include "skin" when they say "organ" (possibly
| doctors or academics in certain contexts, but it's not
| normal usage), and nobody means "Afroeurasia" when they say
| "island".
|
| It's a kind of _reductio_ based on what people will tell
| you when you ask them to define "island", to show that
| definitions they come up with tend to have outcomes they
| don't like--happily, we may just ignore all that and keep
| using the words in a useful and mutually-intelligible way,
| so that language remains tenable. In fact, the reductio
| isn't proving people wrong when they say "afroeurasia isn't
| an island". Nobody treats it that way, so it's not. If they
| did, we'd need a different word for "island".
| jonwinstanley wrote:
| Africa, Europe and Asia are continents, so can't be Islands
| globular-toast wrote:
| The definition of continent is very fuzzy and mostly man-
| made. So all you're really saying is Afroeurasia isn't an
| island because we decided it isn't.
| lhorie wrote:
| In many parts of the world, it is taught that Oceania is the
| continent.
|
| IMHO, saying that Australia is a continent comes with the
| problematic notion that its close-by neighbour New Zealand is
| not part of any continent, which would be weird given that even
| Bouvet island is assigned to a continent.
| sleight42 wrote:
| I almost never comment here anymore but, well, here we are.
|
| Says something about software people that we find such
| fascination with recursion.
|
| Also, I can't help but reflect on a brilliant quote from
| Community:
|
| "Stop being meta. Stop taking everything we do and shoving it up
| its own ass." -- Jeff Winger
|
| With <3
| behnamoh wrote:
| I read each line like a lisp expression: from the end to the
| beginning. Recursion tickles my brain!
| ajmurmann wrote:
| > Says something about software people that we find such
| fascination with recursion.
|
| Interesting! I would have thought everyone would finds this
| fascinating. Is that truly not the case?
| biggu wrote:
| Interesting that you find that interest interesting
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| > Says something about software people that we find such
| fascination with recursion.
|
| Yes, I've always been fascinated by the way software people
| find fascination with recursion.
| brianpan wrote:
| You might also like this:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35567026
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| I prefer https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35569670
| michtzik wrote:
| I would have thought you'd link to
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35574446
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| self-reference and recursion are related but distinct
| ideas.
| jononomo wrote:
| genuine LOL
| chankstein38 wrote:
| I've always been fascinated by the way people find it
| fascinating the way software people find fascination with
| recursion.
| rhyme-boss wrote:
| How dare you.
| leobg wrote:
| Almost as confusing to my brain as SQL JOINs...
| gt565k wrote:
| What, it's just set theory basically
| frakt0x90 wrote:
| "A monad is just a monoid in the category of endofunctors,
| what's the problem?"
| bl0rg wrote:
| [flagged]
| adamgordonbell wrote:
| Wikipedia seems to say Treasure Island is the world's largest
| natural island in a lake on an island in a lake. Not sure which
| source is right?
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treasure_Island_(Ontario)
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| They agree. Treasure Island is #7 from the article:
|
| #7: Largest island in a lake on an island in a lake
|
| Island in Mindemoya Lake on Manitoulin Island in Lake Huron
| (CAN)
| adamgordonbell wrote:
| Oh ok, My bad! The wild thing to me is the picture on
| wikipedia shows its not a small island. All the nesting made
| me think it would be quite small.
| zapdrive wrote:
| But is the last lake on an island?
| dmix wrote:
| The linked website is outdated (the maps should be a signal)
| the last Lake in the list doesn't exist anymore
|
| > Up until the 2020 eruption of Taal Volcano there was a crater
| lake on Volcano Island. It was known as Yellow Lake and Main
| Crater Lake and contained its own small island, Vulcan Point.
| Vulcan Point was thought to be one of few third-order islands
| in the world.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taal_Lake?wprov=sfti1
| a_cardboard_box wrote:
| But then the page for the crater lake says it came back after
| a series of typhoons, but it gives no citation for that
| claim.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taal_Volcano_Main_Crater_Lake#.
| ..
| grumple wrote:
| You can see the lake for yourself on the latest satellite
| images on google maps.
| mikrl wrote:
| Lake Huron also has the #1 and #2 longest freshwater beaches in
| the world (8.7mi and 7mi) , both fairly close to Manitoulin
| island!
| gmiller123456 wrote:
| How are "beaches" defined? Because Pictured Rocks National
| Lakeshore has a "beach" named 12 mile beach. And, having
| paddled next to it the whole way, it certainly qualifies as a
| beach in my mind.
| michael2l wrote:
| Anybody else suddenly have the urge to play Civilization?
| niels_bom wrote:
| Funny to see the website of a previous employer here:
| https://www.mijnlieff.nl (if you do a whois on elbruz.org you can
| check it)
| Nevermark wrote:
| Anyone know what the largest moon of a moon of planet would be?
|
| Around a star around a binary star around a massive star? (Star
| systems can be embedded. We know of double binaries.)
|
| Seriously, it would be interesting for someone to study how
| deeply nested a system might go, and be plausibly stable, from
| what we know of solar system formation and dynamics.
| freetime2 wrote:
| > Anyone know what the largest moon of a moon of planet would
| be?
|
| I had to think about this for a minute. At first thought a moon
| of a moon didn't seem to be possible as the gravity of the
| moon's planet would certainly make an orbit around a moon
| unstable. But apparently if the moon is large enough, and
| separated enough from its planet, it can in theory have a moon.
| Saturn's moons Titan and Iapetus, Jupiter's moon Callisto, and
| Earth's Moon would be capable of hosting submoons. [1]
|
| No submoons have yet been found, though.
|
| [1] https://academic.oup.com/mnrasl/article/483/1/L80/5195537
| twawaaay wrote:
| > At first thought a moon of a moon didn't seem to be
| possible as the gravity of the moon's planet would certainly
| make an orbit around a moon unstable.
|
| No, that's not true. Moons can have moons with stable orbits.
| Not every moon can, though.
|
| If you think about it, the Moon already orbits Earth which
| orbits Sun.
|
| Our Moon could have satellites but the issue is that it is
| lumpy. It is not uniform in density and this causes huge
| gravitational anomalies which prevent long term stable
| orbits. If Moon was uniform it could have stable orbits.
| SpaceManNabs wrote:
| Reading this made me happy. Thanks to the maker of this content!
| There is something beautiful about the next level just being
| present in your mind.
| vrglvrglvrgl wrote:
| [dead]
| zelphirkalt wrote:
| So bascially ... fractal island, you are saying?
| leipert wrote:
| My geography teacher used to say: "On small islands you won't
| find rivers. There is a mnemotechnic verse to remember that: 'On
| small islands you won't find rivers'"
|
| Don't know if it is even true. Stuck with me to this day, if I
| ever meet him again, I will ask about whether small islands can
| have lakes or not.
| eesmith wrote:
| So far the smallest island I've found with something people
| describe as a "river" is Suduroy, in the Faroe Islands, at
| 163.7 km2 (63.2 sq mi).
|
| "the great cirques of upland central Suduroy where the hilltops
| reach an altitude of 574 m, but overlook and to a degree
| shelter the summer grazings of Hovsdalur (altitude about 200
| m). The whole is drained by the Hovsa, a salmon and trout
| river. Freshwater is ample here as everywhere in the Faroe
| Islands, with rivers, count-less streams and an average annual
| precipitation of 1334 mm (Sogaard, 1996)." -
| https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s10745-005-474...
|
| It also has a hydropower plant.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Botnur_power_plant .
|
| Is Suduroy a "small island"? Perhaps! I found a larger island
| which Wikipedia describes as small.
|
| "Rinca, also known as Rincah, Rindja, Rintja and Pintja, is a
| small island near Komodo and Flores island, East Nusa Tenggara,
| Indonesia, within the West Manggarai Regency", at 198 km2 (76
| sq mi), says https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rinca .
|
| Anyone know of a smaller island with a river?
| FabHK wrote:
| Hong Kong Island (with 78 km^2) has Staunton Creek Nullah,
| which is a nullah, so presumably not a river?
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Staunton_Creek_Nullah
| eesmith wrote:
| Hmm. It appears to be artificial. The Wikipedia entry says
| "an artificial open channel" and 'Visit To Places Of
| Historic Interest In The Aberdeen Area Of Hong Kong Island'
| from 1967 (at
| https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/23890119.pdf) says:
|
| "It was up this valley that Sir George Staunton, the
| eminent sinologue and Third Commissioner in the Amherst
| Embassy to Peking in 1816,strolled from the Aberdeen
| anchorage the following year to visit the village Yi in so
| doing to give his name to Staunton Creek now, 150 years
| later, being reclaimed from the sea."
|
| I would not call that a river.
|
| On the other hand, while researching the above I found that
| Lantau Island, Hong Kong at 147.16 km2 (56.82 sq mi) has
| the Tung Chung River.
|
| Lantau Island - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lantau_Island
|
| Tung Chung River -
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tung_Chung_River
|
| That's smaller than Suduroy, and smaller than the "small
| island" of Rinca, making it seemingly a small island with a
| river.
| ricardobayes wrote:
| This is stretching it but this island (Poro Island - 96.6
| km2) seems to have a "stream" and a waterfall into what looks
| like a pond. I wouldn't really call it a river by any means
| though. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poro_Island
| eesmith wrote:
| I don't find any publications referring to a river on Poro
| Island, and from your description I agree it's not a river.
|
| Also, if it were then Rarotonga at 67.39 km2 has a
| waterfall ending up in a pond.
| https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/wigmores-papua-
| wate... . Video after a heavy rainfall at
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AgM7b8WjCPw .
| theandrewbailey wrote:
| Not sure why one would need to make a distinction between small
| islands and not-small islands. Islands can have rivers, e.g.
| Thames in Britain.
| arketyp wrote:
| I interpreted the joke being that a mnemotechnic is like a
| river, poetry flowing, so you won't find one for knowledge that
| is already concisely formulated, like a small island.
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| Thats XKCD hover comment level of clever
| yreg wrote:
| Makes sense, right, as you need to have a sufficient area to
| capture rainwater. Depends on the interpretation of `small` and
| `river`.
| quickthrower2 wrote:
| An island is defined as small if it is strictly smaller than
| the smallest island with rivers.
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| > Depends on the interpretation of `small` and `river`.
|
| I think it's the other way around. If there are rivers, it's
| not a small island.
| metanonsense wrote:
| This reminds me of a fun computer science class back in
| university called "Programming Challenges", which followed the
| Springer book of the same name. Over two or three weeks, we had
| to solve one problem every day. That was really fun! Edit: Forgot
| to mention that the recursive "lake on an island in a lake ..."
| problem was one of the excercises.
| marktani wrote:
| haha it was funny to read your comment. I was wondering where
| the connection was! Thanks for the edit
| sdf4j wrote:
| I wonder what GPT-4 replies to that prompt
| 4ggr0 wrote:
| "The largest island in a lake on an island in a lake on an
| island is Vulcan Point. It is a small rocky island located
| within Main Crater Lake, which is on Volcano Island. Volcano
| Island is situated within Lake Taal, which is on the island of
| Luzon in the Philippines. Although Vulcan Point is not very
| large, it holds the distinction of being part of this unique
| geographical formation."
|
| The title it automatically set for the chat is "Islandception:
| Vulcan Point"
|
| EDIT: GPT 3.5
|
| "The largest island in a lake on an island in a lake on an
| island is known as a recursive or nested island. There are a
| few examples of such islands in the world, but the most famous
| one is located in Canada.
|
| The island is called Victoria Island and it is located in the
| Nunavut territory of Canada. The island itself is the eighth
| largest island in the world and has an area of 217,291 square
| miles.
|
| On Victoria Island, there is a lake called Island Lake, which
| is approximately 10 miles long and 4 miles wide. Within Island
| Lake, there is another island known as Mystery Island. Mystery
| Island is about 0.6 miles long and 0.3 miles wide.
|
| On Mystery Island, there is a small lake known as "Unnamed
| Island Lake". This lake contains another island which is
| unnamed and not well documented, but is believed to be the
| largest island in a lake on an island in a lake on an island."
| [deleted]
| seesawtron wrote:
| Wikipedia entry [0] aruges there is only one "Islands in lakes on
| islands in lakes on islands in lakes" in Canada but this article
| points to another one in Philippines.
|
| [0]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recursive_islands_and_lakes#Is...
| mkl wrote:
| The article is out of date since a 2020 volcanic eruption in
| the Philippines changed things. See eesmith's comment:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35567362
| nickdothutton wrote:
| But I did eat breakfast yesterday.
| gradstudent wrote:
| [flagged]
| ndr wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island#Differentiation_from_co...
| vanni wrote:
| https://www.britannica.com/story/is-australia-an-island
| 2muchcoffeeman wrote:
| That's not and island. That's an island.
| tokai wrote:
| If that counts Afro-Eurasia is by far the largest island.
| cyborgx7 wrote:
| Beat me to it.
| mercwear wrote:
| Too early in the morning for this brain twister of a post title!
| yreg wrote:
| The article would benefit from a uniform style of maps and
| photos. It would be also nice to see the entire outermost island
| on the maps.
| EGreg wrote:
| Can't someone go and make more of this manually inside it ... and
| it can be the largest X in Y in X in Y in X hehehe
| NeoTar wrote:
| So someone else was listening to the 'No Such Thing as a Fish'
| podcast this morning.
| cs702 wrote:
| Cool. Is that as far as it goes? Or can someone identify the
| largest lake on an island in a lake on an island in a lake on an
| island?
| teacpde wrote:
| This is where ChatGPT makes it easy
|
| > _The largest lake on an island in a lake on an island in a
| lake on an island is said to be "Lake Matano" located on the
| island of Sulawesi in Indonesia._
|
| > _Lake Matano is the largest lake in Sulawesi and the ninth
| deepest lake in the world, with a maximum depth of 590 meters
| (1,940 feet). The lake is located on the island of Sulawesi,
| which is itself part of the country of Indonesia. Within the
| lake, there is an island called "Pulo Mahamba" which has a lake
| within it called "Lake Towuti". And within Lake Towuti, there
| is another island called "Una Una" which has a crater lake
| within it. This crater lake is considered to be the largest
| lake on an island in a lake on an island in a lake on an
| island._
|
| Also tried the largest island in a lake on an island in a lake
| on an island in a lake on an island?
|
| > _The largest island in a lake on an island in a lake on an
| island in a lake on an island is not officially documented, and
| it is unclear if such an island actually exists._
|
| > _The concept of nested lakes and islands can create a
| potentially endless chain, but eventually, the size and
| feasibility of such geographic features become implausible. As
| such, it is not practical to identify the largest island in a
| lake on an island in a lake on an island in a lake on an
| island, as it may not exist._
|
| > _However, the previously mentioned example of Lake Matano in
| Sulawesi, Indonesia, is an actual location that fits the
| criteria of nested lakes and islands. Within the lake, there is
| an island called "Pulo Mahamba" which has a lake within it
| called "Lake Towuti". And within Lake Towuti, there is another
| island called "Una Una" which has a crater lake within it, but
| there is no known island within that lake._
| ZainRiz wrote:
| > but there is no known island within that lake.
|
| brb, I'm gonna go toss a big rock
| cs702 wrote:
| Easy indeed... but is it accurate?
|
| Are you sure the AI model isn't, you know, _making stuff up_?
|
| (I can't find Pulo Mahamba island in Lake Matano on any map.)
| Aperocky wrote:
| That's going to be some fountain with that layout.
|
| Or a weird pool in a resort somewhere, can't be that hard to
| make.
| cs702 wrote:
| Pool-sized, for sure, but I think we're considering only
| nature-made lakes, no?
|
| Maybe this is as far as it goes.
| eimrine wrote:
| The last photo is beautiful, three layers of land and two layers
| of water is clearly visible.
| LegitShady wrote:
| I remember learning about crater lake waaaay back in university
| geology, because the way the prof started talking about it was
| always absurd.
|
| "Crater Lake is not actually a crater, its a caldera. A caldera
| is a special type of crater..."
|
| "So you're saying its a crater."
|
| "It's a caldera."
|
| "...which is a type of crater."
|
| "Yes but on a test you have to pick caldera from the options."
| voytec wrote:
| Site's hugged to death.
|
| https://web.archive.org/web/20230414083903/https://www.elbru...
| rbrown wrote:
| My brain hurts
| ryukoposting wrote:
| Having fun imagining how someone would go about researching this.
| Make a Wikipedia crawler that looks for lists of lakes on each
| island. For each lake, read its wikipedia article to find each
| island. Repeat.
| Trufa wrote:
| Someone from Sweden please help me, there I learned that you can
| say something like
|
| "O in a" which means island on a river. (Im sure im butchering
| it, but I'm not to far away)
|
| Maybe you can make this look insane :)
| state_less wrote:
| I grew up on one of those islands on a river. The flow of the
| river passing like a stream of time.
| kzrdude wrote:
| The sentence:
|
| > I aa a e o, a i oa a e a
|
| mentioned in the other comment is understandable to a swedish
| speaker, but it's written half-phonetically. The words i, a,
| and o are properly spelled, however.
| valvar wrote:
| That is indeed true!
|
| The most famous example can be found at the bottom of this
| page: https://www.alphadictionary.com/fun/tongue-
| twisters/swedish_...
|
| a: stream
|
| o: island
|
| i: in
|
| a: not correct, but used to represent dialectical pronunciation
| of "ar", i.e. "is"
| korla wrote:
| Further: e: dialectal version of "det", i.e. "it" oa, aa:
| adding an a on the end of a noun is a dialectal way of
| expressing "the 'o'" and "the 'a'", respectively.
| kzrdude wrote:
| Wouldn't "e" just be a contraction of "en" in this
| sentence? Is it "det" in the dialect?
| keeganjw wrote:
| If the site isn't working for you, try this:
|
| https://archive.ph/gDsQA
| AlbertCory wrote:
| This reminds me of something I did once here:
|
| What country has the highest lowest place?
|
| ChatGPT does know the answer to this, which you probably don't
| unless you've seen this question before.
| darknavi wrote:
| I'd think somewhere like Nepal that is up in the mountains.
| yamtaddle wrote:
| Well it's gotta be landlocked, and it'll probably be small.
|
| Wikipedia reveals that it's... Lesotho. Sure enough,
| landlocked and small. I'd never have guessed it, because I
| didn't realize that part of South Africa was a big
| mountainous plateau.
|
| Nepal evidently has some _quite_ low points, as it 's nowhere
| near the top of the list. Bottoms out at 59m/194ft.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_elevation_extremes_by_.
| ..
|
| Sort by minimum elevation, descending. The "Lesotho" page
| confirms its #1 status for highest-lowest-point. It wins by a
| _large_ margin.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| So you would think.
| aardvark179 wrote:
| I miss my GIS days and getting topology bugs from the national
| land survey of Finland.
| Forbo wrote:
| I'm getting to taken to https://www.elbruz.org/blank.html when
| trying to visit the link, anyone else? I thought it just didn't
| like me using a VPN at first, but it does it even without that.
| Might have gotten the hug of death.
| croisillon wrote:
| nope, got https://www.elbruz.org/empty.html instead
| Forbo wrote:
| Now I'm getting that, too. The fact it changed is even
| weirder.
| ollemasle wrote:
| Here is an archived version of this page:
|
| https://web.archive.org/web/20230414083903/https://www.elbru...
| [deleted]
| ljf wrote:
| Similar HN posts from the past:
|
| 2015 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9104777
|
| 2014 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7902628
|
| 2011 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2317624
| dang wrote:
| Thanks! Macroexpanded:
|
| _Recursive Islands and Lakes_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30263137 - Feb 2022 (1
| comment)
|
| _Recursive Islands and Lakes_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23504158 - June 2020 (2
| comments)
|
| _An Island on a Lake on an Island on a Lake on an Island_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9104777 - Feb 2015 (2
| comments)
|
| _An Island within a Lake on an Island within a Lake on an
| Island (2011)_ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7902628 -
| June 2014 (8 comments)
|
| _Largest island in a lake on an island in a lake on an island_
| - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6154898 - Aug 2013 (5
| comments)
|
| _Two islands in a lake on an island in a lake_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2317624 - March 2011 (1
| comment)
|
| _Islands in lakes in islands in lakes ..._ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1580779 - Aug 2010 (56
| comments)
| igyigyigy wrote:
| This was a recurring set of posts back when Digg was popular
| too
| ljf wrote:
| Yeah, I actually thought it had been posted more recently (in
| the last 5 years) with a bigger discussion thread, but I
| couldn't find it. Interesting regardless!
| menssen wrote:
| I thought this was going to be about "Moose Boulder," whose
| existence was (rather unconvincingly, I think) "disproven" a
| couple years ago, and which begs the interesting question about
| how we define "Largest Lake."
|
| https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/moose-boulder-debunked
| alhirzel wrote:
| I thought the same; the alleged Moose Boulder is in my general
| back yard area and I've thought about doing some "citizen
| science" on my next trip to Isle Royale.
| kimburgess wrote:
| You can go another layer deep too:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recursive_islands_and_lakes#Is....
|
| It's lake islands all the way down...
| [deleted]
| javajosh wrote:
| ...and all the way up, if you consider Earth as an island in
| the lake of the solar system, which is of course an island in
| the galaxy, which is an island in the local group, etc.
| silverfrost wrote:
| returns an empty page for me
| hardlianotion wrote:
| Looks like the owner was frightened away
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(page generated 2023-04-14 23:00 UTC)