> There is unambiguously one direction at Seattle (tangent to the Earth's surface)
and that tangent is the straight line, at least it is within the R^3 spatial universe I live within.
There's confusion here as the article presumes humans to be bound to an S^2 manifold and to consider a Great Circle to be a "straight line" which it certainly is not unless one lives within an S^2 Flatland.
FWIW I did not get that impression at all, and I'm bewildered by all of the combative comments here. It's a cool thought experiment!
The article and title have changed in response to the comments.
I read it after your caveat was added, but I didn't find it intentionally misleading, from the very strong response (which is doing what it accuses the post of doing by claiming it reads 'travel due east') I get the feeling someone may be a bit peeved they didn't 'get it's and instead thought the answer would be some embassy that happens to be directly east of Seattle.
Re:Go east from Seattle
by RaftPeople on Monday June 03, 2024 @09:17PM
(#40569683)
My immediate guess was England or maybe a bit lower and France, but then I saw the arrow and thought "DOH! Canada"
I don't think the question requires the reader to ignore what ‘east’ means, however. There is unambiguously one direction at Seattle (tangent to the Earth's surface) which is facing due east.
I also didn't mean to take a patronising/arrogant tone to the reader and I'm sorry if that was the impression I gave.