this post was submitted on 04 Mar 2026
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Maybe you couldn't, I absolutely could. The space just looks smaller because there's a diagonal square butting into it. Doesn't matter anyway, making the squares smaller was my original comment that sparked this conversation, so I'm right both ways.
No, you're not. It's square packing, this is the optimal arrangement of 17 squares inside another square as far as we're currently aware with a side length of 4.6756 inner squares. You cannot fit 5 squares in the space of 4.7 squares of the same size.
It's also a well-known meme and this is a science meme community.
I'm not concerned about the optimal packing of 17 squares, I'm talking about the waffle in the picture, which visually appears to have plenty of room for 25 squares. I'm guessing it's hard to get a waffle to the exact specifications of a complicated mathematical model, given its composition and construction. But just look at it with your eyes, there is very obviously enough room on that bottom row for two more squares. And if squares still work they way they did when I first learned about them as a young child, that makes room for 25 total small squares. 🤷♂️