Everyday Life

Calculations about the absurd questions that pop up in daily life

If You Guessed Every Answer on Korea's CSAT, What Score Would You Get?

If You Guessed Every Answer on Korea's CSAT, What Score Would You Get?

Guess your way through all 45 questions on the Korean-language section of Korea's CSAT and the math says you'll land near 20 points, with a standard deviation of 6.07. But the odds of a flat zero sit in the exact same statistical neighborhood as the odds of scoring 47 or higher. The probability of a perfect 100 is 3.52×10⁻³² — 8,158 times the age of the universe, even with 8 billion people guessing once a second. The twist: that terrible probability comes from question count, not difficulty, until real perfect-scorer data reveals the actual culprit is a handful of killer questions. Run the same math on the redesigned ACT and the odds get even more absurd.

What's the True Cost of One Avocado? Water, Carbon, and Nutrition

What's the True Cost of One Avocado? Water, Carbon, and Nutrition

One avocado (100 g flesh) gets dissected through three lenses: water, carbon, and nutrition efficiency. The math checks the popular "200-320 liters of water" claim against the primary dataset, tests how much transport mode swings the carbon footprint, and ranks avocado's nutrient-per-liter efficiency against four other fruits.

Gas, Diesel, Hybrid, or EV — Which Is Cheapest Over 5 Years? At 7, the Answer Flips

Gas, Diesel, Hybrid, or EV — Which Is Cheapest Over 5 Years? At 7, the Answer Flips

A car's sticker price is just the opening bid. Add in fuel, insurance, registration tax, maintenance, and resale value, and the total cost of ownership (TCO) tells a very different story. We run the numbers on a Hyundai Tucson in gasoline, diesel, and hybrid trims plus an IONIQ 5 EV — and the cheapest car changes not once but twice as ownership length and annual mileage shift.

New York to Los Angeles: The Lowest-Energy Way to Travel?

New York to Los Angeles: The Lowest-Energy Way to Travel?

A 10 km commute by car uses far more energy per passenger than a bus — unless the bus is nearly empty. We break down energy intensity (MJ per passenger-km) across eleven transportation modes, from walking to electric cars to rockets, then apply it to one real trip — New York to Los Angeles, about 3,940 km (2,450 mi) — to see which one actually wins, and how badly occupancy and grid mix can reverse the rankings.