[filoleg]

You say “this is America”, but my mother (who grew up in USSR/Russia and was in her mid 30s at the time) was seriously asking middle-schooled me on multiple occasions whether 0.7 liters of milk was less than 0.55 liters. I don’t remember the exact numbers, i just remember that the smaller volume one had 2 digits past the decimal, and the larger one just had 1 digit.

And no, she wasn’t testing my knowledge, she was seriously confused, as she would ask me that even later in life. Mind you, she has a masters degree. She is in her early 50s right now, and she is fully of sound mind to this day, not senile or anything like that.

Imo, this type of silliness is rather common across many different places, but Americans just tend to own it and not be afraid of coming off silly (if that’s how they genuinely end up behaving in a given situation).