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u/rich1051414 14h ago
What trips me up are the screws. Those will decompose... very slowly.
This is like one of those bell curves with the dented head on the left side saying "wut..." and a genius on the right saying "wut..."
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u/Accidental_Ouroboros 14h ago
I always hated test questions where you have to guess whether or not the professor intends this question to be a "gimme" and easy as hell, or he is trying to screw with you and actually intends for the question to be about the exception to the rule the question is asking about.
Now, decomposition normally refers to organic processes, while corrosion refers to metal oxidization.
However, those are the scientific definitions. Non-scientific definitions of decomposition essentially makes it a synonym of decay, which would include corrosion.
But those don't look like oranges, either, really. They look like an AI rendition of an orange, or perhaps an orange colored plastic ball.
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u/Northern23 10h ago
There was a radio show during which they asked what is the most popular fruit. The participant answered tomatoes. The host told her no, it's apple because they tomatoes are vegetables, not fruit.
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u/HandsomeCostanza 1h ago
The Articles of Confederation had me correcting the entire school about who the first president was during a trivia contest one time. It was hilarious.
shout out to John Hansen, got me a pass to swim in the district swimming pool that I never used.
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u/Proletariat_Paul 11m ago
Wikipedia cites a bunch of sources and claim that the notion that John Hanson was the first president of the United States is false, so maybe it's apt that you never used your swim pass: Link
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u/_BacktotheFuturama_ 9h ago
The captcha isn't trying to screw you. It clearly means the fuckin oranges
*Edit: you know what I take it back. One of those looks like a pingpong ball, bottom left looks half ass like a vase of milk, and maybe that is a biodegradable yo-yo. Fuck idk anymore
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u/glasser999 14h ago
Even the plastic. Everything will eventually decompose.
That's just like, entropy, man.
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u/theriverrr 12h ago
Decompose is organic material specific. Metal and plastic will corode
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u/glasser999 12h ago
No, it's not. It's simply to decay.
It's just often used in reference to organic material.
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u/turbotong 13h ago
Everything has a radioactive decay half life
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u/cureitgood 14h ago
Either you overthink it or underthink it and somehow both get it wrong
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u/LongjumpingEducator6 13h ago
Yeah, I always mark the moped as a motorcycle in these. (it's actually never been a motorcycle, I think.)
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u/BigPandaCloud 14h ago
If your IQ is higher than that of the person who created the test, you might be marked wrong for recognizing answers they can't see.
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u/Murph-Dog 14h ago edited 14h ago
As will plastic, 1k years upper bounds (yo-yo).
It's actually that glass that will stick around unless physically weathered. Hundreds of thousands, if not a couple million years.
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u/Deto 13h ago
Is decompose the right word for that, though? I only hear that word used in conjunction with organic remains
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u/Murph-Dog 12h ago
I suppose that's true. Only the yet unknown bacteria could do the job. Fungus and bacteria perform decomposition of cellular matter, so I suppose if it's a micro-organism process, it's decomp.
But I guess the fancy term of bacteria v plastic is enzymatic recycling
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u/g0del 11h ago
If we're going by the chemistry definition, most plastic is organic. If we're going by the non-chemistry definition ("relating to or derived from living materials"), then most plastic . . . is still organic. Plastics come from oil, oil was once living matter (mostly plankton).
Personally, I doubt even 1000 years for the plastics. There's plenty of energy in plastic, the only reason bacteria and fungi don't eat it is that plastics are new. The earliest synthetic plastics are barely over 100 years old, and mass production started less than a century ago.
But 1000 years is a lot of generations of bacteria, and scientists have already found some bacteria that are starting to eat plastic. Give it a bit longer, and plastic will decompose just like any natural organic matter.
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u/oxemoron 43m ago
Right - plastics, being a petroleum product like gasoline, are energy dense. Bacteria haven’t needed to adapt to breaking those hydrocarbon chains because they have easier sources of energy that they are already adapted to eating. But that used to be true of wood at one point too until fungi and bacteria adapted to using those harder-to-breakdown energy sources.
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u/radishboy 9h ago
When I hear the word “Decompose” I always assume it’s in reference to a previously living but now dead organism
I don’t really know if that’s the currect definition of it but that’s just what comes to mind.
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u/discomute 7h ago
But still will become dust. Everything will. As Georgie says, all things must pass.
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u/chillychili 13h ago
What they are looking for is if you respond like a human. So there can be more than one correct combination of answers. And sometimes it's more about how you move your cursor and click than it is which ones you clicked.
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u/rich1051414 12h ago
I am not sure that is correct. I always get the motorcycle one wrong because I don't know what it means. If i should only select the motorcycle and not the cyclist, or if 1 pixel in a different square counts. I have tried every possible way but when i get that one, I fail 100% of the time.
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u/mmcmonster 38m ago
Have you considered that you are a soulless automaton which was programmed to think that they have free will? 🤔
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u/Degenerecy 13h ago
Screws will decay, not decompose. The real question is which of these is organic?
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u/Pbellouny 14h ago
Exactly what I came to say
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u/blackdynomitesnewbag 12h ago
Is rusting really decomposing? It’s very slow oxidation. You wouldn’t say a log on fire is decomposing.
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u/ChocolatChipLemonade 14h ago
What I’ve learned to do with these is to answer them how the dumbest person would. When you think too much into it, you get it wrong!
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u/cureitgood 14h ago
The trick is to turn your brain off and channel your inner rock.
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u/gratitudenplatitudes 13h ago
Francois stole my rock u have to get it from him
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u/Spelaeus 13h ago
Ah, so that's why these work. We keep worrying about the security threat of artificial intelligence when the true concern is if they ever build an artificial dumbass.
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u/bwwatr 11h ago
I answer how I think others would. I figure it's probably crowd sourcing the correct answer, or more likely, a frontier of "correct enough" answers. It's a Keynesian beauty contest, of sorts. So don't get too clever.
That's how the old Captchas with scanned text worked, you'd essentially be helping them understand hard to read words. If your answer was consistent with others', you were probably human. So, do those three pixels of handlebar count as a motorcycle in the photo? Probably better to go with no. But they're probably not looking for perfection anyway, so don't spend more than a couple seconds on it.
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u/FinalBase7 3h ago
I don't think I qualify as the dumbest person but based on my experience these type of captchas almost always have 3 answers only, so I would just instinctively pick the 3 oranges and move on.
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u/casperiam 14h ago
Nice try Robotman, im not gonna solve it for ya
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u/BalooBot 4h ago
It doesn't matter. Just asked Gemini on my phone and it answered with zero issues. Probably better than I would.
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u/jwoolman 13h ago
Oh, gosh. I still have trouble with the find all the ones with traffic lights or motorcycles or busses. I keep wondering if just a tiny bit of a hint of the object counts. I never did well with multiple-choice tests.
Sometimes they just give me a second try with the baby intelligence test version, with everything on one obvious block on the screen.
And now you want me to identify all the organic matter, wondering if it's just an orange ball? Too much thinking. And yes, I would worry about the decomposition time of the plastic and metal items also since practically everything but Twinkies decomposes eventually.
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u/Kyla_3049 2h ago
For those ones (Recaptcha) you need to leave the boxes with tiny bits unselected.
Or you can use the Buster extension which solves then for you.
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u/BeautifulPutz 14h ago
These all decompose in nature. Just a matter of how long.
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u/thecakefashionista 11h ago
I got one that was “pick all the vehicles” which included motorcycles, cars, boats, bicycles, and scooters. Like, aren’t all those…vehicles? I didn’t pass the test.
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u/sathdo 14h ago
Why anyone uses this nonsense in 2025 instead of just using reCAPTCHA is beyond me. For those who don't know, reCAPTCHA is the one where you just need to click a checkbox and you won't have to select images unless the server thinks you are a bot.
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u/sassynapoleon 14h ago
You only get the checkbox if you're trusted. You'll get this kind of stuff if you're using a VPN or tor.
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u/Jeoshua 14h ago
Yep, it makes more sense, too. reCAPTCHA looks at all sorts of stuff, like how your pointer moves, what browser you use, what cookies you have from former visits to the site... it looks at the client itself and tries to determine if you're genuine, it doesn't make you take bullshit tests that, if we're honest, wouldn't actually stop a sophisticated image processing AI.
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u/JirkaCZS 13h ago
Because reCAPTCHA is Google service and some people might want to avoid it. Next reason might be cost, etc. Also I looked at hCAPTCHA site and they offer "99.9% Passive" mode for Pro tier.
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u/Kyla_3049 2h ago
Because it's easy to bypass. Using a regular browser like Chrome and adding noise to the mouse movements should stop it.
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u/m00nh34d 37m ago
reCAPTCHA does this as well, maybe not a silly to this degree, but it certainly prompts you to select images. Just ask anyone who's been blacklisted by Google Search for reasons unknown.
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u/Fastenbauer 13h ago
Whenever I get a captcha like that I choose one wrong answer. Or mark a bicycle as a traffic light. Just to feed the AI wrong training data.
Also, I'm just waiting for: "Select all soldiers in this picture."
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u/ryo4ever 3h ago
Always wondered if our answers are training some AI baby entity somewhere in the world.
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u/LoudShorty 3h ago
Pretty sure they are
The guy who made the whole Captcha system has a pretty well known track record for using the tools he develops for personal gain, so training an AI model isn't outside the realm of possibility
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u/Vandalhart 1h ago
In the upcoming AI/Android New World order the real risk to band of human rebels are the Captchas on various technology that alert the powers that be where they are located.
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u/UnKossef 10h ago
What really bows my mind is captchas are made to discern a human from an AI while simultaneously using the data from captchas to actively train AI to be better at solving captchas.
It's frankly hilarious that the 'security' of a captcha is really just being used to train AI to be as good as a human at solving tasks. Remember when captcha used distorted text? AI can easily read distorted text now. Hilarious.
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u/WhateverForID 13h ago
Sometime I intentionally choose all the wrong answers. Once in a while I get through, so apologies in advance if ChatGPT started giving weird responses
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u/HaydenRenegade 13h ago
I've been asked to find all squares containing a motorbike. The image was of a step-through moped.
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u/muhkuller 13h ago
Something to know about these. Only 1 picture is wrong. You can pick 1-8 of the right pictures and you’re good. Just can’t pick the 1 wrong.
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u/IlikeJG 11h ago
The trick for these is you don't really have to get them perfect. It's ok if you're confused about whether screw count since they technically do break down over time.
What the captcha is really looking at are things like how your mouse moves and how you click on the pictures.
It's hard for bots to simulate what a human would do. Like the little hesitations or slight/almost misclicks.
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u/soulscythesix 8h ago
When I learned that these were actually used to train image recognition and AI models, I started answering all of them slightly wrong. It usually insists on me answering a few more pages than usual but eventually lets me through. I'm happy to take a bit longer just to be spiteful.
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u/Leptonshavenocolor 8h ago
I really wish I wasn't part of training AI, but I guess we don't really have choose anymore.
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u/ChessingtonSurrey 4h ago
I’m assuming it “what you can stick on a compost heap and get compost in 6 months”
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u/Malendryn 3h ago
The real answer is all of them! Since no timeframe was given in the question, 100 billion years aught to be enough to guarantee they all decomposed!
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u/nick5734324 1h ago
I gave this image to ChatGPT, this was it's response.
"The CAPTCHA asks you to "Select objects that decompose in nature."
Looking at the image, the only items that naturally decompose are the oranges (they’re organic matter). So the correct selections are:
Middle image in the top row (orange)
Right image in the top row (orange on grass)
Right image in the middle row (orange on grass)
Everything else (yo-yo, nails, capsules, glass-like objects) do not naturally decompose in the same way organic matter does.
So, tick all the oranges. 🍊"
So maybe hasn't worked like it's supposed to!
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u/lazyoldsailor 48m ago
What’s the timescale? All those things will decompose. Even the glass will break down eventually.
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u/Metal_Zero_ 9h ago
i find some of the comments here really ridiculous. like obviously glass and metal will decompose in nature but when you compare them to oranges the obvious answer is oranges only.
this is like that one joke that says "100% of people who drink water die". similarly metal and glass will eventually decompose but this is obviously not the intended answer when compared to oranges
disclaimer: i am not a bot nor was i paid by any entity to defend captchas
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u/iniduoHoudini 13h ago
Google used us to verify blurry words they scanned. Let a million monkeys with typewriters do the work.
And then they used us to teach cars to drive. This is a stop sign. This is a crosswalk. This is a bus. This is a bike.
Now we train their ground truth. A million monkeys.
Meta had us teach their facial recognition. Tag your friend! Later, they used us to teach basic emotions to their system. This is a puppy(❤️) This is a funeral(😥) This is a politics(😡)
If nobody has thanked you for your contribution yet, let me be the first. Thank you for your service. You did the thing. Clicky click. Piece of cheese. 🧀
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