Pew Research Center science quiz.

[elagache]

Dear WeatherCat know-it-alls . . . .

A neighbor sent me a interesting online quiz from the Pew Research center concerning public knowledge of of science.  You'all can also "play:"

http://www.pewresearch.org/quiz/science-knowledge/

The results are very interesting.  There is a report on the results here:

http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/09/19/the-latest-news-iq-quiz-how-our-web-visitors-stack-up-against-the-public/

However, they recommend that you take the quiz before seeing how others have done.

Enjoy! 

Cheers, Edouard 

[Steve]

Edouard and quizzers,

Weren't most of those just general high school science sort of questions? I fit into the "some college" category, and none of those college classes were science other than a geography class. I found the quiz easy, and got them all correct. The only one I wasn't positively sure of was the laser question. But the results could easily be skewed, as there is no time limit, so it essentially an open book test via Google if one wants to cheat.

[elagache]

Howdy Steve and WeatherCat know-it-alls,

Weren't most of those just general high school science sort of questions? I fit into the "some college" category, and none of those college classes were science other than a geography class. I found the quiz easy, and got them all correct.

Actually if you look at the questions more carefully, it isn't general science so much as the science behind current issues like fracking and climate change.  So it is investigating whether or not the voters have enough background to understand the issues they are voting on.

Getting them all correct put you in the top 7% of the original sample group that the Pew Center interviewed.  Assuming that they did a good job of getting a representative sample, that means most people aren't qualified to vote on the matters they are expected to vote on.

I think you are correct, anybody with a decent high-school science education and staying abreast of current events should have been able to get all the questions right.

Of course, I had a little fun with this one.  As I mentioned, a neighbor forwarded this to me.  I promptly then posted it onto the V-8 Buick website.  My neighbor only got 9 correct.  The guys on V-8 Buick were all reporting close to perfect.  So I explained to my neighbor:

Of course you didn't do as well  . . . .  You drive a Chevy when I drive a Buick!!

Cheers, Edouard 

[Blicj11]

I'm not quite as smart as Steve but I am smarter than my brother, which was my main goal. I missed one. Because I fell asleep at the wheel and clicked on true when I meant to click on false.

So it is investigating whether or not the voters have enough background to understand the issues they are voting on.

And I'm smart enough to cast an intelligent ballot, which I have to believe is a common characteristic of WeatherCat users around the world.

[JosBaz]

 

Also managed to get all 13 correct. Not sure if it because I'm an Alfa Romeo driver or a WeatherCat user.

Reading the report I was most surprised by the 'fact' that more than half of the public seems to think Lasers work by focusing SOUND waves! What??

Anyway... wasn't it Mark Twain who said "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics."

[mcrossley]

And Windows users can get 13/13 too 

Only 20% of people know we have a nitrogen atmosphere! 

[Gwyfyn1]

It seems we Welsh are also quite clever, as I had a 100% correct. Now, whether this is because I am naturally brainy or because I drive a Dacia Duster 4x4, my wife would probably say the latter!!. Would you Elegache like some of our rain? January - 280mm; February so far 73.6mm.

[elagache]

Dear Blick, JosBaz, mcrossley, Gwyfyn1, and WeatherCat fans, 

And I'm smart enough to cast an intelligent ballot, which I have to believe is a common characteristic of WeatherCat users around the world.

  . . . Hmm, do you think we should make owning WeatherCat and running a good quality weather station a prerequisite to vote? 

Also managed to get all 13 correct. Not sure if it because I'm an Alfa Romeo driver or a WeatherCat user.

Obviously both attributes contributed!! 

Anyway... wasn't it Mark Twain who said "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics."

Well it is sadder than that at least in my opinion.  Lying is intentional.  It is extremely difficult to obtain the truth via statistical means.  When I was working on the methodology for my PhD I took a good hard look at statistical methods and got plenty discouraged.  I felt I would get a more reliable case using qualitative methods because the logic involved is much more straightforward.

In the modern world so much of what we are told isn't "truths," but statistic inference.  Considering how difficult it is to design studies that are truly reliable, it is most likely that the vast majority of the "truths" in our world - aren't!! 

And Windows users can get 13/13 too 

  . . .  Yeah, but you are cheatin' - what sort of car do you drive!?!?? . . 

Only 20% of people know we have a nitrogen atmosphere! 

This surprised me as well.  As a scuba diver, nitrogen has a big role in our activities.   From nitrogen narcosis to decompression sickness.

It seems we Welsh are also quite clever, as I had a 100% correct. Now, whether this is because I am naturally brainy or because I drive a Dacia Duster 4x4, my wife would probably say the latter!!.

Excellent choice in motor vehicle! 

Would you Elegache like some of our rain? January - 280mm; February so far 73.6mm.

Well, February is looking better already.  In the first 6 days of February we have received 12 times as much rain as we got in all of January: 0.85" (22 mm)  However, obviously we need all we can get so . . . . . . send it over - ASAP!!!

Cheers, Edouard 

[Bull Winkus]

Count me as another one who drives the right car and uses the right weather software!

A Toyota Venza & WeatherCat!!!!

Statistically speaking, since all out of 13 questions were really easy, shouldn't the graph be shaped like a hockey stick, with most folks skewed toward the high end of answers correct? Instead it was shaped like this,  , only with me and my big belly in it. I noticed that the men beat the women on every question? So? That's why the girls wouldn't talk to me? They were intimidated by my superior knowledge of scientific trivia? 

 
Herb

[mcrossley]

. . .  Yeah, but you are cheatin' - what sort of car do you drive!?!?? . . 

Ford Mondeo Estate - boring!

[elagache]

Dear Herb and WeatherCat know-it-alls,

Statistically speaking, since all out of 13 questions were really easy, shouldn't the graph be shaped like a hockey stick, with most folks skewed toward the high end of answers correct? Instead it was shaped like this, 

Alas, your comments should all give us all some unpleasant concerns and gave me some bad memories.

As you say, these questions should have been answered mostly correctly by anyone who graduated from high school and stayed abreast of current events.  Since being a good citizen is part of the high school curriculum and staying abreast of current events is part of being a good citizen . . . . anyone should graduated from high school should have done well.

Thus we are presented by a undeniable problem: getting a high school diploma doesn't not in any way shape or form imply that such a person in fact deserved it.

You comments reminded me of a particularly dark time in my PhD.  I had taken seriously the concepts of learning that are basically bedrock to our education system and designed a really nifty piece of artificial intelligence software to promote learning in a useful and refreshing way.

I started a set of pilot studies to confirm that the software was working as I intended and that students were indeed learning as I expected. Zero, zip, nada, no way - no learning happening at all.

After something like 6 years of twists and turns - I had nothing to write a PhD on and had to start over from scratch.

What I ended up pursuing was an idea of learning as an existential phenomena.  Instead of assuming learning happened by taking a "device" (a human being) and then storing data in it (knowledge), I concluded that learning was a fundamentally transformative process.  To make learning happen, people had to be transformed in some way so that they were (if in a small way) different people.

The intellectual movement that I was part of was basically black-balled into non-existence and most of us were thrown out of academia.  However, looking back on those experiences, I fear that society may be too wedded to old traditions of learning that simply don't work very well.  Worse, for all the hype over innovative educational schemes - it is essentially only that - hype.

Definitely another one of those not very happy thoughts . . . . .

Edouard

[Bull Winkus]

Oh, gee, sorry Edouard. I had no idea!

I've simply resigned myself to the uncertainty of human intellectual capacity. I grew up thinking of myself as being below average without realizing that the average was much lower than I had thought. While as an adult of many years, I know I'm not that smart (I've met smart people. No comparison!), but I'm increasingly surprised at the number of people I meet who stand in awe of my greatness.

I'm sure you feel the same. Cheer up! I just handed you a left handed complement.
 
Herb

[elagache]

Hi Herb and WeatherCat ponderers of world affairs,

Oh, gee, sorry Edouard. I had no idea!

I've simply resigned myself to the uncertainty of human intellectual capacity. I grew up thinking of myself as being below average without realizing that the average was much lower than I had thought. While as an adult of many years, I know I'm not that smart (I've met smart people. No comparison!), but I'm increasingly surprised at the number of people I meet who stand in awe of my greatness.

Well, as you can guess, I've thought long and hard about such things and definitely feel a gloomy outlook very much born of the idea that modern societies have bet the store on the wrong virtue: rationality rather than humanity.

For all our education, we fail to see human greatness slipping out of our grasp.  Just as an example, compare the letters written by the soldiers of the American civil war with the letters written during the Vietnam or later wars.  During the civil war, literacy was a luxury.  Those who possessed it wrote with great eloquence.  100 years later, the gut-wrenching struggles of live and death were the same for modern soldiers.  Yet, for all that modern men knew that someone of the 1860s could never know, rarely does the writings of modern soldiers stand up to their comparatively ignorant ancestors.

One of the quotes that inspired me as I worked on my PhD was one from Blaise Pascal:

The heart has reasons that reason cannot understand.

Our modern world can still find something haunting in that idea, but I fear we have allowed our hearts to slip away and in so doing we have allowed our very humanity to slip away as well.

Edouard

[Bull Winkus]

If I may say so, I think you have to realize that time is a lens that pulls focus on the human condition. We can't compare the humanity of the present with that of the past. The observational point of reference is too different. When today's human race is seen by tomorrow's observers, it will look entirely different than it does now. The complexity and therefore the beauty of humanity lies not so much in the divisions inherent in so many different cultures, occupations and economic standings but in the tapestry they weave together over time.

The same could be said for all of those who took the test. All of the individuals in our society are connected in many more ways than sharing the same educational venues and mass media. Each one of us has to prioritize time and resources based on individual goals and histories. Knowing or not knowing the answer to each of the 13 questions is an attribute defined in a moment in each person's past where one opportunity was overlooked in favor of another. For no one can be all knowing.

[elagache]

Dear Herb and WeatherCat armchair philosophers,

If I may say so, I think you have to realize that time is a lens that pulls focus on the human condition. We can't compare the humanity of the present with that of the past. The observational point of reference is too different. When today's human race is seen by tomorrow's observers, it will look entirely different than it does now. The complexity and therefore the beauty of humanity lies not so much in the divisions inherent in so many different cultures, occupations and economic standings but in the tapestry they weave together over time.

That is a very modern way of thinking about our world, but I think it is a critically flawed one and my example had a careful feature that I think reveals the point very nicely.

Ultimately human experience is objective - not subjective as our exaggerated sense of freedom would prefer.  The examples of letters written by solders has one undeniable theme everyone must face: the certainty of death.  As such, it brings forth a universal that does permit comparison even over a century.

I think it is very hard to argue that young men of the Vietnam war were most sophisticated at encountering the certainty of death than the young men who fought the Civil War.  In general, as humans become more and more burdened by the knowledge, customs, and cultures of our very complex world, the less we seem able to grapple with the very fundamental issues that characterize human life.  An obvious point that would offend many intellectuals of today is that during the time of the Civil War, religion was a important source of ideas about what make us essentially human and how we could face death with dignity.  Those same intellectuals would be very hard pressed to find in the soldier's letters from Vietnam a secular substitute that allowed those men to face death with the same dignity.

In the end, the knowledge that our modern world provides us with is of little comfort.  Science robs human beings of any divinity - instead insisting the only rational explanation is that we are some sort of anomaly or fluke.  Multiculturalism isn't the bazaar of ideas in which to indulge our freedoms, it is grim awareness that we have no cultural roots upon which we can depend.  Worst of all, freedom can be a most destructive potential wrapped in an apparently benevolent opportunity.  Freedom can be (and often is) the freedom to make a mistake.  Anyone who doubts this only need consult the divorce rate.

It seems obvious that knowledge should be helpful in conducting one's life.  However, the failure of artificial intelligence is proof enough that there is no "calculus of existence" that by itself will permit humans to succeed.  If we do not have some sort of aesthetic to guide us in sampling this bounty of information, we run the risk of knowing too much and pondering too little.  Eventually we all shall face the same harsh realities that soldiers have faced for generations.  Can we say with confidence that a high school graduate in 2014 will be better prepared to face death than one in 1914 or 1814?  I simply cannot believe that is true.

Edouard