Wheel vs. Door Debate Makes Waves at North Shore

Unless you have been living under a rock for the past couple of weeks, chances are you must have stumbled upon the infamous “doors or wheels” at least once. If you do live under a rock, it is understandable if your brain is blanking with a soundless “...” at the thought of the very random meme. Suppose you want to establish a unique and clear-cut position on the subject at hand for the next time your friends rehash the debate. In that case, it is time you be au fait with the latest internet buzz that seemingly originated out of nowhere else than the bottomless depths of the Athens of our day: TikTok.

Believe it or not, #doors or wheels is all about a trivia-like question about whether or not there are more doors or wheels in the world. The internet is all riled up by the feud, with the hashtag reaching over 62.2 million views on TikTok! Whether you feel pretty strong about the controversy or you need a break from the dire news coming at us from pretty much everywhere else, buckle your seatbelt, folks!

The case for wheels seems evident at first, what with the number of vehicles that litter the streets worldwide; as a matter of fact, Junior Illan Arama calls for an end to the debate with his “wheels, and it isn’t even close” partiality. However, Team Door soon emerged with convincing pictures of the world’s skyscrapers and all the houses that all have at least two doors themselves.

Do doorframes qualify as a door? Is a valve a door, a cog a wheel? Aside from the endless lines of questioning trying to establish the criteria for the count, people have put forward some pretty strong arguments for both sides.

The fiery dispute seems to have taken its toll for some students here at North Shore. “Honestly, ever since this huge controversy, my life has been a mess,” says Junior Gabriella Kahen. “Who knows?! Everyday, supporting evidence is brought up from each side that pulls me from one to the next. What’s next?! Windows vs. wheels?!”

Gabriella makes a fair point. When it comes to online disputes, dividing the world into two heckling opposing teams is an inescapable trend with which most of us are all too familiar. If you recall the intense what-color-is-the-dress incident, Blue and Black versus Gold or White became the winning meme of 2015! Eventually, some scientists felt obliged to contribute to the narrative with serious discussions about human perception of colors and neuroscience.

Or maybe some remember another fierce internet controversy from 2018 that also induced caustic reactions: when a short audio snippet had people voting for either “Yanny” or “Laurel” as the “correct” sound in it. Again, this called for the intervention of scientists with explanations about the sensitivity of human ears to different sound frequencies to put the case to rest.

With the figure exceeding billions for both doors and wheels, the debate is starting to get out of hand when the qualifying criteria of both doors and wheels expanded to encapsulate everything under the sun, including tiny wheels produced by Hot Wheels and Advent Calendars. A bit too boggling to wrap your head around, isn’t it?

Lucky for us, Junior Alex Sutton is here to draw the line for Team Wheel: “First, it depends on what you consider wheels. If you consider it any wheel on anything like a toy or something, the answer’s definitely wheels. But if you say wheels are just tires, then it’s a different story.” Despite the intricacies of the discussion, Alex leans more towards the side of Team Wheel: “In most ways you would define a wheel and a door, wheels would likely still come out on top.”

Like Alex, Sophomore Steven Sardar also recognizes the many nuances to both arguments yet finds himself rooting for Team Wheel: “As much as I wish it was the door, I think wheel sounds more legit.” “Personally,” says Steven, “It seems more feasible that there are more wheels than doors; however, some people are stretching and saying micro transistors, which exist in the millions in every computer chip, act as doors.”

Junior Ezra Cohen offers a well-researched case for Team Wheel: “One article I found,” says Ezra “Says the average home has ten doors.” According to Ezra, Google is less clear on the average number of wheels in a home, “but it’s easily much more than ten.” From there, the case for wheels is obvious: “A wheel is one of the six simple machines and is therefore used in quite a lot. For example, most drawers use a track with wheels, each drawer having multiple wheels. I could go on and on the listing different examples, but at this point it’s unnecessary since wheels are already the clear victor.”

While Team Wheel seems to prevail here at North Shore, such an end to the “doors or wheels” discussion is not in sight unless some great mathematician or analyst manages to make a near-perfect data chart of all the doors and wheels in the world. But, that requires an impossible level of calculation and data accumulation, with a clear set of parameters and definitions to determine what counts or does not count as a door or wheel. In that case, I sure am glad to have spoken to North Shore’s very own Mr. Wykes, here to blow the debate to bits with his facts and logic! “My car has four doors and four wheels-no, five wheels-so I'm going to say there are more wheels. But, wait, no! My car has five doors!” When asked about the wheel in his trunk, Mr. Wykes’ count reached five-five. According to Mr. Wykes, “If I only make a decision based on the evidence of my car, I would say there’s an equal number.”

In spite of the uncertainty surrounding this internet feud, it is clear that once you have taken camp on the subject, you stick for life. It seems that either cannot convince the other, regardless of the evidence both sides of the controversy present to supplement their arguments.

Once again, the internet is entertaining another silly disagreement. If you ask me, the entire discourse about doors and wheels will fade from hot searches in a few short days. Look, if you want to take on the task of counting every wheel and door in the world, go ahead.

Until then, let the debate roll on.