Over the past week, a new debate has taken the internet by storm based on one simple question: are there more doors or more windows in the world? I first came upon this question on TikTok, and therefore had to investigate where it is from since I am absolutely a sucker for random questions like this. According to an article written by Elissa Bain from HITC, this debate was started via a Twitter poll set up by user Ryan Nixon. It started out on Saturday March 5th as a debate between friends, but the poll currently has 223,347 votes with wheels taking the lead at a narrow 53.6%. Of course like any good viral trend, this debate has spread onto TikTok, with users posting videos about what side of the question they land on and particular items that made them switch.
This is where we get to the real substance of the question. Do cupboards count as doors? What about dollhouses or advent calendars? How about wheels that aren’t on vehicles, like the racks in your dishwasher or the ones on your sliding patio door? People are invoking bikes, skateboards, roller blades and hospital gurneys for the wheels argument at the same time as those in favour of doors gesture to hotels, schools and universities, office buildings and shopping malls. In my own little social experiment, every person I have posed this question to has been unable to pick a clear answer with any certainty. And then once the discussion begins, I proceed to throw endless examples from either side into the mix and my subject gets utterly stumped. The beauty of this question is that there is no possible way to ever know the answer – simply because no one has (or perhaps can) count up all the doors and all the wheels on Earth. Several folks have tried to break down the math by looking at small scale ratios of wheels to doors among their personal property. For example, some argue that every car has 4 wheels but will range between 2-4 doors, so wheels must outweigh the number of doors. Others say that no matter where you live, the number of doors will outweigh wheels since a house or apartment has multiple doors but no wheels.
Whatever you believe this viral debate has certainly reminded us that sometimes, the simplest questions can be the most mind-boggling to tackle. The Guardian writer Stuart Heritage points out an indescribable air about this question that is reminiscent of other simple viral internet trends of the past, such as The Dress (which people saw in two different colour combinations–black and blue or white and gold) or how dogs would wear pants (do yourself a favour and Google this if you haven’t yet). If you find yourself bored this weekend, or you simply feel like distracting your friends from their essays, I highly encourage you to ask them this question and have a conversation about it. However, I do not claim any responsibility for late assignments, destroyed friendships or wandering minds as a result of this article….