this post was submitted on 19 Oct 2025
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Why are we starting this scenario with the arbitrary restriction of 3? Yes, if you give people any number of items and tell them there is a finite number of categories, they were will find a way to divide those items into three. That doesn't mean they wouldn't come up with a more compelling argument for their choices when told to divide into 4 groups.
At no point have our options ever only been "fruit or vegetable," but yeah I guess if you tell people those are their only choices of course they'll adhere. But like... I've never known anyone who though those were the only choices?
The point is that may people will instinctually call mushrooms a vegetable
If we take that same example and add 4 categories and then add milk as another item I am still willing to bet the average person will put mushrooms as a vegetable and make the categories fruit vegetable dairy meat even though vegetables aren’t real and you could have a category of animal products.
Now if you only quiz the biology majors you might get a different result but in the U.S. only 38% of people are college educated and the most common major is business
I have no college credits and I would never call a mushroom a vegetable