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I feel slightly offended. Because it's true.
(Alt text: "Do you feel like the answer depends on whether you're currently in the hole, versus when you refer to the events later after you get out? Assuming you get out.")
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this post was submitted on 04 Feb 2024
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As a native speaker, that makes sense, but they still both sound interchangeable.
Edit: In this situation, anyway. Other people are pointing out that "down a hole" wouldn't work if it was a hole you couldn't actually be "inside of", like a pothole in a road. In that case "in a hole" would still be okay, as it's a partial kind of "in" like water in a dish.
The pragmatics of the sentence in the comic is that the person is in/down the hole, and this is not a normal state of affairs. The exact sort of envelopment isn't emphasised, and I imagine the choice would come down to exact idiolect. I'd say "down", I picture someone from another province or old for "in".
"Down" definitely implies vertical entry, although it could be an abstract downwards, like "he's further down the tunnel" - an entry is imagined as being at the top by default.