People send me stuff.
In my Inbox today was a link to a Science Poll conducted by the Pew Research Center. The aim of the poll was to gauge American knowledge of science and it is a parallel poll to one conducted by telephone. Given the millions spent on global warming/climate change messaging, I was shocked to see the results of this question on Carbon Dioxide. Note what I circled in red.
Similarly, I thought far more people would get this grade school science question right. Only 20% did.
The choices for both of the questions were amazingly simple, and I thought these would score far higher in the general population. One has to wonder about the 24% of college graduates that also missed the CO2 question and the 69% that missed the Nitrogen question. I also wonder what percentage answered “Carbon Dioxide” as the primary gas of Earth’s atmosphere instead of Nitrogen.
I got 100% on the test by the way.
You can take it yourself here: http://www.pewresearch.org/quiz/science-knowledge/
See how your results compare with the 1,006 randomly sampled adults that took part in the Pew national telephone survey and review how you responded to each question.
For more findings from the survey, read “Public’s Knowledge of Science and Technology.”
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I’ve joined the 7% and I’m not even American! That was on GCE “O” level physics taken 50 years ago. And they say there’s been no dumbing down .
Greg you know nothing about me, your personal insult of me is noted and unworthy of response.
Dismal.
The only way to influence opinion on CAGW and probably everything else is through money (and possibly sex!).
Greg says:
October 8, 2013 at 10:04 am
You’re right; I was wrong. The question didn’t say “gas in the atmosphere”, but “temperature in the atmosphere”, so radiation produced through H fusion is more correct than CO2. Badly worded question.
JEM says:
October 8, 2013 at 10:04 am.
When I were a lad, we conducted an experiment at school which involved putting a candle in a bell-jar and CAREFULLY introducing some oxygen into the jar. The result was satisfyingly convincing.
Bill, please note the 😉 at the end (it’s a wink, means : joke).
BTW your response that my comment is unworthy of a response, is unworthy of a response . 😉
The fact that the survey “climaxes” with a subjective question about CO2 after 12 straight-forward science facts would suggest it has a point. It is not at all clear that “most scientists believe” CO2 causes the atmosphere to warm up. Once again, governmental climatism has so thoroughly dictated what scientists are supposed to believe – and enforced this belief through the sycophantic patronage system – that it isn’t possible to conclude what the majority of scientists believe. I still think a majority of scientists are being conservatively silent on this issue.
The question is both leading and mis-leading. Pew does that. .
in high school physical science class we got oxygen and hydrogen from water then put a glowing ember into each container, in the oxygen it flamed up brightly, in the hydrogen it made a popping sound from its tiny explosion.
@dodgy geezer –
It’s more than 17 years, it’s 80 years since the peak of modern temps in the 1930s (despite 40% more CO2 since then), 800 years since the peak of temps in the Medieval Warming Period, 1900 years since the peak of temps in the Roman Climate Optimum, 3500 years since the peak of temps in the Hittite-Minoan-Mycenean warm period, and 4700 years since the peak of temps in ancient Egypt. I should think this would REALLY be enough to prove the lack of any link between atmospheric CO2 and temps.
Chad Wozniak says:
October 8, 2013 at 10:25 am
And about 126,000 years since warmth during the Eemian Interglacial peaked at 8 ± 4 K above the mean of the past millennium over Greenland.
The present interglacial has been cooling since the end of the Holocene Climatic Optimum about 5000 years ago, with the Minoan Warm Period c. 3300 YBP possibly equaling HCO warmth. The massive East Antarctic Ice Sheet quit retreating around 3000 years ago. The Modern Warm Period still hasn’t equaled the Medieval, Roman or Minoan peak warmths, so the past & current decades are far from “unprecedented”.
Ok so I took the test. 13 out of 13 as I would expect most others from here also got.
I’m not from the US. I’d be disappointed if anyone who had studied general science ( not branched into a specific field of study as happens later ) in a UK high school ( that’s 12-16 here.) got any of those questions wrong. It’s fundamental stuff.
I’m astounded at how few, in relation to the total poll, managed the top result. Astounded. It really is kid’s stuff.
A good example of having to provide the wrong answer in order to give the “correct” answer. I tell students that the art of test taking involves determining what the teacher wants you to answer even if the teacher happens to be wrong.
This question is really about what scientists “believe” (Faith based teaching), not about which constituent gasses have the most effect on atmospheric temperature. That would be: gasses H2O, CO2, CH4 in descending order. Faith based teaching, harrumph!
Ah, remember when we used to say “It’s worse than we thought!” as a joke? Now this is what has become of a society which grew great on its scientific understanding.
Would the last person to leave the Western world please turn out the lights? – It’s on that whitish plastic plate thing on the wall near the door, you see the bit in the middle? – Press that to make it move and the lights’ll go off. Thanks.
I think people are getting ‘dumber’ rapidly …. and it’s in-part due to the changing media culture. In the past, if you wanted to watch TV, you had few choices and had to watch the evening news because there was nothing else on. So, even as slanted as the news could be, a lot more people learned something each day. Now with so many entertainment choices, the vast majority of the ignorant masses NEVER watch any hard news or education programming. They only choose base entertainment shows, movies, computer games, and internet drivel. Combine this effect with reduced reading levels, poor schools, and constant social networking by kids and it leads to where we are and are going …..
I don’t mean to be mean or anything……
But shouldn’t we all be deliberately answering the questions wrong?
I say go there and be wrong.
Be as wrong as you can be., Be 100% wrong. .
For the sake of being right be wrong.
Here’s an ~anatomically~ correct replacement for PEW’s question #13 – http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/GlobWarmTest/Q4.html
O Olson says:
October 8, 2013 at 9:09 am
…I noticed this too. I’m married to a scientist (a real one) and I don’t think we have any idea what MOST scientists think about CO2 or how much it contributes to temperature rise…
I have an even bigger problem with the original question. I don’t think that there are such people as ‘scientists’. or at least not in the way most people do. I think that ‘science’ is all about using ‘the scientific method’, and that anyone who does this is ‘being a scientist’ while they are doing it. So anyone using the ‘hypothesis/experiment/prediction’ process is a ‘scientist’.
Most of us will do this at some point in our lives – for instance, dropping a pin in order to have a better idea where the first one went. Some people are paid to investigate natural phenomena using this technique as a job – I would tend to call these people ‘Researchers’.
This enables me to completely avoid a major issue with modern democracy – the idea that there are certain people who, by virtue of their qualifications, are allowed to hold opinions on technical subjects and tell other people what to think.
By the way, in answer to your question in the post 19% chose carbon dioxide as the primary atmospheric gas. From the complete report – http://www.people-press.org/files/legacy-pdf/04-22-13%20Science%20knowledge%20Release.pdf page 13.
dodgy, that was great, indeed people that claim co2 drives the climate are be definition NOT scientists…..also great point scientist is NOT a job, as you said anybody can practice scientific method, no credentials needed.
I’m not surprised at all. Watch people sign up “en masse” to a petition to ban water:
Margaret Smith says:
October 8, 2013 at 9:45 am
> Don’t know what I was expecting but the test was very, very simple. … I’m in my 60s and grammar school educated.
Perhaps grammar schools were better in the 1950s. Plus, we had Mr. Wizard on Saturday TVin the States.
Regarding the last question…change a few of the letters and the answer is diamonds.
OK I got 100% too.
There are two disturbing conclusions one can draw from the poll results:
1) a large percentage of the population is made up of dopes.
2) They vote.
I got 100% too. never went to university.
I want the finest PhD’s known to humanity and I want them NOW!
Let’s really skew the bell curve…… count me in for 100%