I took this fun science literacy quiz, and got 47 out of 50 questions correct.
The ones I missed were all in biology and life sciences, my weakest subject. Since so many of the angroids label climate skeptics as “scientifically illiterate”, and because climate change is specifically mentioned, I thought it would be fun to share and to have readers post their scores. Many of the questions are simple, like the first one:
Then there’s some tougher ones, like about Planck’s constant and some that require some simple physics math, F=ma and stuff like that. There’s a bit of irony in whose website the poll is on.
The Christian Science Monitor.
http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2011/1209/Are-you-scientifically-literate-Take-our-quiz/
Surprisingly, there wasn’t a single question about climate change, even though they mention it. If you feel like taking it, don’t succumb to the temptation to look up everything on the Internet…there’s no sport in perfect scores.
Paul Westhaver says:
April 7, 2012 at 11:10 pm
Well, semantics give me problems with such questions, too. The correct answer is still that Hubble “established” it.
44, but I only got zygote because of the timely intervention of my wife, who did some biology in her degree.
Well, semantics give me problems with such questions, too. The correct answer is still that Hubble “established” it.
Well then mark me as 29 🙂
42/50. And I can’t believe that I can still remember the phases of both mitosis and meiosis 29 years after learning them!
I’m still surprised that I managed to get such a good education at a state-run school in the outer suburbs of Brisbane, Australia.
Too slow – it would take 100 pages –
(Yeah, they want to maximize their page counts)
Plus they are slow loading – and I have very high speed link.
It’s all pretty basic stuff – but I quit at 14.
Leif Svalgaard says: April 7, 2012 at 9:06 pm
There’s a bit of irony in whose website the poll is on.
They did give as choices of the age of the Earth and the Universe the interesting number 6015 years.
You missed that one, too, Leif?
I got 47 of 50. Didn’t think it was gonna be a quiz on ancient Greek, though. Fortunately iI was a fan of Roy Chapman Andrews.
A dismal 41/50.
Some I just didn’t know, some I couldn’t remeber!
Max, yes you can interpret it that way but you miss out on the point which is that Science Literacy is much more than mere knowing of science facts. The so called “facts” that you know may well be wrong, as we often find out in the climate debacle, thus the ability to recite facts without knowing how to validate them shows not scientific literacy but scientific belief.
So sure at the lowest level of the scale you have to know basic facts about science in order to be literate but if that is all you aspire to it’s disappointing indeed and a failure. That lowest common denominator definition you presented isn’t any different than if you are being just like the Jeopardy Watson program, sure you can recite facts but there isn’t anything else there. Just because you can spout facts from memory doesn’t make one literate in science. If one can’t apply that knowledge being a reference book isn’t going to help.
As for how I did on the test, I didn’t take it on principle. Science is not about knowing everything in every field. It’s about the ability to find out things as needed. Anthony’s requirement that one not be able to research the answers is part of the mind set of the knowing the rote answers that is pervasive in education. Real science literacy involves the ability to research and learn new material as needed. The article’s test isn’t a measure of science literacy, it’s a test of a mere random 50 alleged facts. The very idea of this silly test is highly anti-scientific. It is an good example of what is wrong with the modern education systems in various countries.
Science Literacy also involves intelligence and the ability to apply it using the scientific method.
So if you want to use your limited narrow lowest common denominator definition fine but you’re saying that it’s acceptable that the bulk of the population only need be “rote believers in science facts told to them by science authorities” and that they should never question those facts nor apply the scientific method to know how to reproduce the results, how to falsify a hypothesis, how to measure, how to do experiments, how to assess whether or not the alleged “facts” should be trusted or not and how far, and how to adapt when old knowledge is overturned or refined with new results.
For fun sure. As a measure of science literacy most certainly not.
Many of the people I discuss climate issues with are scientifically literate by the meager rote fact recital definition you put forward yet they fail at science due to their “believing in science facts” that prevent them from being able to assess the claims of the scientists that they put authority into – it’s just the same as if they believed in magical sky beings that make it rain. If that is the level of scientific literacy that people are aiming for then we’re in deep trouble as a civilization.
Kobayashi Maru 50/50 🙂
I had high hopes of matching Anthony’s 47, but 42’s okay I guess. I had two lucky guesses and two wrong answers I should’ve got, so I’ll say they cancel.
A few questions I wouldn’t have got if not for my study of climate science the last couple of years — so some good did come out of it!
I was clueless on Nimbus (which I’m sure Anthony got!) but I got zygote. It’s interesting that we all got different wrong answers as it makes the test look like a good, broad-ranging one.
43 – and I’m a retired shop teacher. I used to feed my students questions to ask their science teachers about global warming, because the entire science department was comprised of warmists. I miss those days….
Is this available without the clumsy format?
Its so awkward one question at a time. Surprised someone hasn’t pointed that carbon chemistry isn’t exclusively organic chemistry- carbides and carbonates don’t count as organic.
About 6 reasoned guesses +
2 completely lucky guesses +
3 dumb mistakes (atomic number, not atomic weight, dummy) =
40
Interestingly, I lucked out on the bio questions (including Zygote) – a few months ago I decided it was time to get better informed on microbiology & genetics, so I’m pretty fresh. But I’m still woefully ignorant on meteorological minutiae. And the triangle question – I didn’t remember that term at all, and prior to the advent of CADD, I used geometry & trig constantly in my work.
The slowness of the test and the progression drove me crazy. Does it count that I was at a 100% before my patience ran out?
I took it a while back and got 44/50. But then again, it was about 1 a.m. when I took it. Accounting for the TOB adjustment, that puts me in league with Anthony!
😉
There were a couple I got right not due to my science literacy, but my limited knowledge of Greek mythology. A few guesses and a couple of DOH! wrong answers.
I missed the Greek goddess of strife and discord question.
Jim
47! Though I must admit, I used their Latin hints as a crutch on several that I really didn’t know.
28 right (including zygote). I don’t appear to know too much about Saint patrick’s Day either (60%).
I only scored 27 out of 50. Probably would have scored more if I knew Greek. I know I could have got 50 out of 50 if I cheated.
Gee, some of you must be pretty smart!
Ah hm,100%. Still what’s best with me is my modesty
46 out of 50. Not a bad effort by the CSM there, although I thought a couple of the questions had a ‘trick’ element that was unnecessary, but lots of fun overall.
29 out of 50. Embarrassed, biology was easy, chemistry was ok, not so good with the physics. Out of school 30 and been a nurse for that long, not bad though. With a little studying might bring up grade with touch up on physics…Was fun to take…
I managed 36 some answers were wild guesses right or wrong and one or two I managed by doing what you’r told to do in exams…READ THE QUESTION. It does work (sometimes).
James Bull
40 outta 50. Bah. Humbug.
Still…not bad for Comparitive Religion Major and liberal arts, yes? (40 yrs past)
I read. Do that make me an ‘autodidact’? Tell you one thing, when I smelled the rat in AGW a decade ago I spent probably 200 hours on John Daly’s (RIP) Waiting for the Greenhouse, learning a new language. Credit him with anything I know about Climate.
Then I tortured all my acquaintances and started fights in bars for a year or two. Now I don’t talk about it, just watch the Circus Algorus marching on…
“Thunder Lizard” – definitely ‘tricksey’. “Nimbus” almost got by me (low to medium altitude) till I realized they were asking for a translation, not a breakdown of the atmospheric column.