Recently, this little quiz from Time Magazine has been doing the rounds. Reactions to it have mostly gone along the lines of – and I’ll paraphrase here - “Holy fucking shit how the fuck can people not answer these piss easy questions how fucking stupid are people?!?!?”
Yeah, yeah, whatever. You know stuff. Cool story, bro. But science education isn’t (read: shouldn’t be) about declarative knowledge. Memorising facts isn’t really science. For my students, I don’t really care if they can memorise the reactivity trends down the alkali metals and down the halogens – because you can simply deduce them by understanding the trends in electronegativity of the elements. And even the trends in electronegativity can be simply deduced by knowing atomic structure. It’s safe to say that I’ve done pretty much minimal memorisation in my career so far. I once thought about memorising the periodic table as an exercising in pegging and memory palaces, but - eugh – effort, and besides, I own this beautiful thing and have a caffeine addiction.
Instead, I propose the following exercise to test your real, actual factual, scientific know-how. Let’s see how pedantry over the number of planets helps you with this.
Question 1
A national newspaper prints a story on how an expert believes the chaya leaf will be a cure for cancer. What is the most important thing to look for in the story:
- a) The expert’s qualifications
- b) Which institution the expert comes from
- c) The experiments they have done
- d) Whether the reporter writing the story has a positive opinion on the subject
- e) Whether your friends have tried the cure yet
Question 2
You are presented with the following graph:
What does this graph tell you?
- a) Nothing in particular
- b) That organic food causes autism
- c) That autistic people eat more organic food
- d) That there is a hidden third relationship at work
- e) That the person making the graph is a shill for a pharmaceutical company
Question 3
A company is offering a programme to make you rich and successful in business. They say they take thousands of people each year on this course. To prove it works, they invite four people to speak about the benefits of the programme and how it transformed their lives. Of the following choices, which further evidence best indicates that the programme works as advertised?
- a) At least three more speakers to make it statistically significant
- b) Another testimony from an independent source
- c) Nothing, the number of testimonies is sufficient
- d) Interviews and testimonies from the people for whom the program didn’t work
- e) Background information on the people offering testimony
Question 4
A shop has an automated alarm by the doors to test if people are walking out with stolen goods. The alarm sounds. Given that the alarm is guaranteed to catch 95% of all thieves, what is the probability that the person caught by the alarm is a thief?
- a) 0%
- b) Less than 95%
- c) More than 95%
- d) 100%
- e) More information needed
Question 5
The following is a logical syllogism. The two premises lead to a conclusion:
- Premise 1) Some doctors are tall
- Premise 2) Some men are doctors
- Conclusion) Some men are tall
The above syllogism is valid: true or false?
Question 6
A medical trial for a new drug to treat cold symptoms is undertaken. 20 people are placed in the control group and given a placebo pill. 40 people are put in the intervention group and given the drug, but 15 drop out over the course of the study. Does this:
- a) Strengthen the study because the control and intervention groups are now nearly the same size
- b) Weaken the study because we lose information on the drop outs
- c) Weaken the study because the statistical significance is affected
- d) Strengthen the study because people who the drug didn’t work on are weeded out
- e) Have no effect on the study’s outcomes
Question 7
You are presented with the following graph on the news. It represents unemployment figures for two small groups of people in contrast to the previous year. The news report uses it to demonstrate a massive difference in the relative unemployment rate between the two groups.
Why is the graph misleading?
- a) It lacks a title on the Y axis saying that it’s a percentage
- b) The data should be continuous, like a line chart
- c) The graph doesn’t start from zero
- d) “Group A” and “Group B” should be labelled better
- e) The colour choice produces a sub-conscious bias in the viewer
Question 8
A new pre-screening test for breast cancer is announced in the news. The experts who made it claim a 99% success rate in detecting the condition early, an improvement on a previous test which had only an 65% success rate. In the old test, 1 in 100 people would be falsely diagnosed, in the new test 1 in 50 would be falsely diagnosed. Which test is better?
- a) The old test
- b) The new test
- c) They’re about the same
- d) More data needed
- e) It’s complicated
Question 9
All toupee’s look fake. How do you evaluate this statement?
- a) Examine fake-looking hair
- b) Examine real-looking hair
- c) Examine hair whether it looks “fake” or not
- d) You cannot evaluate this statement
- e) The statement is true by definition
Question 10
A newspaper publishes a piece on the safety of a new vaccine given to combat the flu in people over 60. Their story centres around two people who died shortly after receiving the vaccine, and states that it should be recalled. What additional evidence is required to demonstrate that the vaccine is dangerous:
- a) The rate of flu infections in people over 60
- b) The rate of vaccine uptake in people over 60
- c) The rate of flu mortality in people over 60
- d) All of the above
- e) Nothing, as the story is sufficient evidence to indicate a problem
Answers shortly. No cheating please.
