About 25% of Americans Don't Know the Earth Revolves Around the Sun

[DracoSuave]

Dear creationists. Please ensure that if you post an argument, that it cannot be absolutely destroyed by five minutes of google searching. If you claim something doesn't exist...

micro evolution can be observed and reproduced, not macro evolution.

...make damn sure it's something you couldn't find in two seconds. [http://lmgtfy.com/?q=observed+speciation+events]

Additionally, when talking about evolution...

right now no one definitively knows anything about our origins

...make sure you don't change the topic to abiogenesis

and for a true way to test it out, would take thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of years of observation.

...and don't make the mistake that because we can't watch something unfold directly doesn't mean we can't actually understand it. This above is a terrible fallacy based on the twin assumptions that science isn't based on falliblism, and that we can't learn things based on their effects on the present. Can we observe a speciation? Yes. Can we observe millions of speciations from protozoan life to self-aware conscious life? No. But that doesn't mean the speciation we HAVE observed can't be the process that did it. Can we find a living common sncestor? No. Can we find proof of common ancestry within DNA? Yes.

so right now arguing the validity of one theory or another is pointless. who know maybe we were simply created as stated in one of the many other religions. and being an atheist is a religion, just atheists practice science and what not, and believe that we are our own god so to speak.

I dunno what other theory you're talking about. Theories ARE tested, and have borne the scientific scrutiny. You're aware that origin myths CAN be tested, right? If your origin myth includes evidence that there was an extinction event 4000 years ago, then you can predict there'd be evidence of that event 4000 years back in the geologic column. If it says the universe is 6000 years old, then we'd see creation in progress by looking 6000 lightyears away in space. When we DO look 6000 light years away, why do we not constantly see stars being formed within the blink of a single day, or even seven days..... or even at all?

Some 'theories' as you incorrectly label them are utterly falsified by easily available evidence. You want to give them equal footing, you need a LOT more than 'Were you there?'

 

[A_Parked_Car]

This is entirely unsurprising to me. Not too many people are going to know things (even basic things) if it doesn't directly impact how they live their day-to-day lives. The exception to this being that reading up on astronomy or whatever is a hobby of theirs.

You could look at anything really. Very few people actually know anything about history. Not even just about events in the past but also what the discipline of 'history' even is. That doesn't mean they are unintelligent. They just either don't have any interest in it or have never been properly taught. Perhaps both. It just doesn't have immediate relevance to how they live their life. While it is true that historical events, and the fact that the Earth rotates around the Sun, does have an impact on their lives, knowing about those things doesn't really matter for non-specialists.

 

[ChaplainOrion]

The first one is extremely saddening but the other two... The second one is based on your religious belief and I'd be lying if I said I correctly answered the last one, it caught me off guard and it just seems like that's what antibiotics do.

 

[Erttheking]

One thing kinda annoys me about that saying. If half of the people are dumber than the average, than the other half are smarter than the average. Averages are what you get when you add up everyone and divide by the number of people. If half of the population had an IQ of 100 and the others below, the average wouldn't be 100 IQ, it'd be lower than that. So truth be told, there can be only a few average people in the world and everyone else is above or below average.

Er, yes, I understand how averages work. I'm not sure that you do, though, because there's way more than "a few people" near the average.

IQ is a bell-curve with roughly standard distributions, meaning that most people (68% or so) fall within a score of about 85 to 115.

I wasn't saying that they were, I was saying that they could be.

 

[Jadak]

Did the universe begin with a huge explosion? Only 39% answered yes correctly.
Did human beings, as we know them today, develop from earlier species of animals? Only 48% correctly said yes.
Do antibiotics kill viruses? Only 51% correctly answered no.

Too be fair, the first two of those will get disagreed with on religious principles. Don't get me wrong, I would agree that they are incorrect, but you're not going to get great statistics representing intelligence when your questions have the potential to be confrontational with people's beliefs.

As for the 3rd question, hardly surprising. Knowing exactly what antibiotics are and how they work isn't on the same level of common knowledge as "earth orbits sun" is or should be.

Coupled with the fact that I'd bet even fewer people have a strong understanding of the difference between a virus and other biological issues. In general, I think many people just view it as 'sick is sick' and at best, antibiotics as 'anti sick medical stuff', so I would pretty much expect asking people that one to be a roll of the dice regardless, stupid or not.

 

[Arawn]

After reading through (most) of this thread I had afew thoughts:

To the person that brought up that theory has a different meaning; you are correct. It does have more than one definition. People are referring to the other one in this case. Both sides are correct. Theory can be both proven and unproven statements.

Evolution makes sense, but by no means is it logical. I still can't wrap my head around how skunks came about; a creature that uses bad smells to thwart would be attackers. Why wouldn't all creatures go that route? Nor why some lizards became the present day birds. And as others pointed out the human biology is inefficient. You can indeed connect the dots, but there are several dots let over as well many questions. Recently I recall hearing that Bill Nye (the science guy) was in a discussion of evolution vs creationism. While many say that Bill "won" for the most part it's an open debate on the matter (too lazy to look for the link)Evolution

My final thought in regard to creationism; Greek mythology, Norse mythology, and fairy tales. I've read may stories through
my childhood. So when faced with religion I gave it the same treatment; a story to explain everything a limited people used. Before they were labeled as mythology or folklore the Greeks worshiped Zeus. He was the god of thunder! Gods were everywhere and controlled all we did. Sound familiar? At the time they were valid religions in their own right, but you can see the similarities with current religions. Again it makes sense, but not logical.

As for the survey itself it's hard to figure how many people were serious. Guess it depends on how it was given. They should take a survey on the people that take surveys. See what % of them that take such survey's seriously. For good of humanity, for kicks, or perhaps even for gain. Why they do it, and what motivates them. Guess it would take a few years to figure that one out.

 

[Elfgore]

The belief based questions, like the evolution and start of the universe, is not fair to ask. They answered wrong because they believe differently. That's just a low-blow.

Now the earth rotating question is inexcusable.

being ignorant because of your dark age beliefs is still being ignorant. It's like disagreeing with gravity because "its just a theory". America needs to learn that science is not simply a matter of opinion or beliefs. If i told you a cat was a dog because it was my belief you would call me a fucking idiot.

That's coming off as very arrogant and I'm an atheist as well. Though I think Christian reasoning makes little sense, what gives me the right to tell them their stupid and wrong? Science and Logic are on my side, but even then it doesn't give the right to treat the religious like they're a bunch of idiots because they choose to believe differently.

The statement you just made is why people think Atheist are arrogant jerks. A small minority of Atheists can't accept other beliefs even existing other than their own, making them just as bad as the Christians and other religions they oppose.

 

[The Artificially Prolonged]

Oh come on everyone knows that the sun of orbits America, like everything else in the universe

While I'd like to laugh at what appears like more evidence that a good proportion of Americans are idiots, I have to remember that my younger brother a fully grown adult genuinely asked me which way you turn a screwdriver to loosen a screw.

 

[Sirron Kcuch]

I don't trust statistics if they are not followed by more data such as the mean, the standard deviation and in this case, having a pool of 50000+ people. 2200 people may not be an appropriate number for extrapolating this much. Also, it does not state how these people were chosen. I don't call BS on this, but it's really difficult to trust this info.

There's also a trick you can do, ask people "How many animals did Moses bring on his ark?"
You might find yourself surprised by how many people say "two"

Spoiler

It wasn't Moses. Oh you!

 

[gigastar]

Also, how does one "kill viruses" anyway?

Best theoretical way is to damage the RNA within the virus, though this can yield mixed results depending on the damage done.

Virus is a single organic molecule, it's not even an organism of any description. It isn't even alive.

Well first up, viruses are not a single molecule. Most viruses consist of a coat of protein, a strand of RNA and a bunch of enzymes that will mess with the target cell in a way that it produces as many copies of the overall virus as possible.

And second, viruses are only considered to be not alive as they dont fulfill scientific guidelines on what is alive. However its mindless drive to reproduce itself makes it only slightly below most kinds of insect, whose nervous system works by holding thier body back from what its made to do.

 

[DoPo]

-ignore-

 

[Comocat]

I saw this and my first thought was basically that all this shows was that the survey was meaningless. I have hard time believing half of Americans know about something as useless to daily life as the big bang, yet less than a quarter of Americans realize the earth moves around the sun.

 

[BoogieManFL]

I can't imagine how such results are possible. I knew the answers when I was in 5th grade, if not earlier. And that viruses are different from bacteria.

 

[Cecilo]

This got me thinking, and it's funny how they only report on Americans, but here, http://www.scienceinschool.org/print/165

The Amount of Europeans that believe the Sun revolves around the Earth, is 29%, 4 percent more than Americans. The Survey is more extensive for them as well,

You should check it out, apparently it isn't just America that isn't as intelligent as we would all like.

 

[ryo02]

two of these will be disagreed with via belief and one genuinely isn't particularly common knowledge is someone trying to create biased results on purpose???.

 

[Baresark]

Australia is considered one of the smarter nations, but I'm almost certain that it's just a few very bright people carrying the weight of a very dumb overall populace. Most people don't care to educate themselves on matters more difficult than the location of the nearest pub.

I couldn't agree more. People are like, "It's only a theory, it hasn't been proven!"
- it's known by anyone who is familiar with actual science and the scientific method, that a theory can only be disproven. If it exists, it exists simply because it was an observed and tested phenomenon.

OT:

How stupid can the average person be. This is why there is a large scientific literacy movement in the US. I think that it would have been much worse if those questions were asked 10 years ago than it was today. Of course, the religious nuts see this as an attack on their religion, which makes them look worse and consequently sound much more unintelligent.

I also realize that I am living in an area where scientific literacy is much higher than a place like Alabama (just as an example, not knocking them at all). I live in New Jersey, we are very metropolitan and have a tendency to be better educated in terms of that area of education. But, people can naturally be dumbasses with it too. If I was asked to answer a few quick survey questions when I was running around and they asked about antibiotics killing viruses: I would have said yes on the fly... then kicked myself for sounding stupid, 30 seconds after walking away. But the Sun revolving around the earth... There is no one alive today who was around when the opposite belief was held... there is little excuse for that.

 

[rtazen]

The total lack of data in this article was pretty pathetic. I "get" that it is trendy to kick America and all, but seriously....let's at least show our sources. As an American, I am amused by the folks in other countries that point at 'merica and make fun. I love that people freely bash those who follow their faith as well, how inclusive!

Seriously, those without shit on their sneakers, take the first step on the carpet.

 

[NuclearKangaroo]

this cant be correct... right?

i mean they probably surveyed babies or something

 

[CriticalMiss]

The religious don't have a 'live and let live' mentality though, otherwise there wouldn't be so much persecution of people for not living to the standards set out in their choice of fairy tale book.

Tell you the truth, if douchebags like you are supposed to be the future, than I don't want any of that.

Also the young Earth creationists are very much a minority when it comes to religion, but you'd rather just make snarky remarks about religion than actually do any research, and they're supposed to be the "ignorant" ones.

Right, because condemning people for loving people of the same gender isn't 'douchey' or 'ignorant' at all.

 

[Gary Thompson]

i wouldn't consider myself an atheist, i used to class myself as religious, and being a Christian =\= an excuse to be in denial about basic scientific ideas. Here in the UK most Christians would be horrified by the mutation of belief being peddled. Scientific denial is a feature of a fundamental minority and should be rooted out. I've heard creationists argue that thermodynamics disprove unrelated areas of genetics. This isn't a matter of insensitivity, religious beliefs are not incompatible with science. Acting like they are makes man Christians more angry than even atheists because it is miss using their beliefs. There is such a thing as a modern minded religion.

Yeah, basically this, sorry for insulting you earlier, I'm not religious but I do get pissed off when people try to mock and generalize the beliefs of the majority of humanity for their own amusement.

I have a soft spot for religion, but I'm too much of a skeptic to have too much faith in anything really.