'Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it'. Something similar can be said for a lot of things.
As far as not needing basic knowledge, there's been instances where people have died trapped in snowbanks because they had no idea their car would kill them with carbon monoxide.
There are warning labels on hairdryers not to use them in the bathtub which indicates there are some people who do not understand the danger of mixing electricity with water.
It's possible to create chlorine gas by mixing items commonly found under kitchen counters and in laundry rooms.
I guess this could be considered Darwinism at work.
In reply to Curmudgeon:
You forgot the sticker on new gas cans informing you not to dump it out on a camp fire.
Kenny_McCormic wrote:
In reply to Curmudgeon:
You forgot the sticker on new gas cans informing you not to dump it out on a camp fire.
My dream is to one day find the idiots who decided those new gas cans were a good idea and just beat the ever living snot out of them.
93EXCivic wrote:
Kenny_McCormic wrote:
In reply to Curmudgeon:
You forgot the sticker on new gas cans informing you not to dump it out on a camp fire.
My dream is to one day find the idiots who decided those new gas cans were a good idea and just beat the ever living snot out of them.
Agreee. A friend of mine in college saw those when they came out and then went to every other place in town to buy as many old ones as he could before they disappeared.
Another significant issue of a scientifically illiterate community is that you will develop the attitude of, "You don't really need this information." or "That science is no more valid than my superstition." This leads places to having really poor science programs that then fail to give foundational information to the couple of students who will go on to become scientists, engineers, or whatever. You get the states who develop poor science curricula because their citizens do not understand and value science. They then have trouble being technologically competitive, because they are not raising future scientists.
For more real world stuff... I work a totally blue-collar production job: brewing beer. The vast majority of it is manual labor and following defined procedures. However, there is a definite hierarchy even on the production floor based pretty directly on how well you understand the science involved.
It's funny, we're doing some emissions testing here at the shop. Plugged in the gas analyzer and voila, 21% O2 in the free air. I had to laugh. BTW, it's amazing watching the gas analysis of the exhaust of a brand new car on start-up. You can see the cat (catalytic converter, more high school science!) heat up and the numbers go almost back to free air levels.
Adrian_Thompson wrote:
So I may have been wrong on my gender assumptions, although they only gave overall gender, not ages specific gender answers. It turns out the females only outscored males in 2 out of 13 questions, they were "Which of these is a major concern about the overuse of antibiotics?" and "Which is the better way to determine whether a new drug is effective in treating a disease? If a scientist has a group of 1,000 volunteers with the disease to study, should she... "
There is an absolute correlation to education level though. In every case Some collage outscored HS or less and college grads outscored some collage. No big surprise there.
No immediate correlation across the age brackets up to 64, but for those 65 and over either the baby boomers had E36 M3ty education or Alzheimer’s is rampant. In general that age group scored the lowest.
the 64/65 was the same thing that caught my attention ... 1 yr from now it seems to show that I'll forget nearly everything I know now 
I guess I can count myself as an elite member of the 13/13 group. Let's hope that protests won't decry "Down with the 7%!"
Combine the subject matter of two questions for some real-world understanding:
In the early 1900's, some guy with the last name of Haber discovered how we could use combustion to convert nitrogen gas into sweet, sweet ammonia. This ammonia becomes nitrogenous fertilizer that most of the world's population depends upon. Before this time, we were desperate, scraping bird poop off of islands.
Nowadays, natural gas is combusted to produce ammonia, solidified and converted into fertilizer.
I'm so proud, I just had my recently turned 12 year old take the quiz, she scored 10 out of 13 only part way through 6th grade. Happy daddy
Yay I'm barely smarter than a 6th grader. .
Smart cookie you got there Mr. Thompson
Mitchell wrote:
I guess I can count myself as an elite member of the 13/13 group. Let's hope that protests won't decry "Down with the 7%!"
Combine the subject matter of two questions for some real-world understanding:
In the early 1900's, some guy with the last name of Haber discovered how we could use combustion to convert nitrogen gas into sweet, sweet ammonia. This ammonia becomes nitrogenous fertilizer that most of the world's population depends upon. Before this time, we were desperate, scraping bird poop off of islands.
Nowadays, natural gas is combusted to produce ammonia, solidified and converted into fertilizer.
That makes me laugh when I think about the villain in the Doctor No. novel getting rich off of bird poop. (shakes head). An evil mastermind and his claim to fame is bird poop. Really?
EastCoastMojo wrote:
Yay I'm barely smarter than a 6th grader. .
Smart cookie you got there Mr. Thompson
could this be the pilot for a new TV show ?
Curmudgeon wrote:
The question about antibiotics reminds me of something which happened to me. I took my daughter in for chest congestion when she was maybe 5 years old. Nothing earth shaking, but with her asthma and her propensity not to let us know she wasn't feeling well a precautionary measure. Diagnosis: mild common cold which is caused by a virus.
The doc said, 'I suppose I need to write a prescription for antibiotics', and I said ''they don't work against viruses so it's pretty much useless to do that'. He looked at me and said '95% of the people who bring their kids in and hear their kid has a virus demand a prescription for antibiotics. You are very well informed'. That was a stunner; I figured with all the various discussions out there it was common knowledge that antbiotics are useless on viruses but effective on bacterial infections such as pneumonia. But people demand their use, even when they are useless and do more harm than good.
Overuse of antibiotics has led to some of the 'superbugs' that docs have to face now. That's a sample of how dangerous ignorance of the basics of science can be and it's going to come back to bite us hard.
I think the thing that scares me the most about your story was that the doc obviously knows about the problem..and has just knuckled under to it.
Maybe I'm blowing it out of proportion, but reading your story reminded me of the first time I read Kornbluth's "The Marching Morons". One of the things that really touched a chord with me then (as a teen in the 70s) was just how stinking tired the smart folks had become as they dealt with the stupid. It seemed like they still felt a civic duty to keep society going, but as individuals--they had such a sense of fatigue. I wonder how many other educated people are now doing the same thing as the doctor you mentioned.
I know that when I personally meet someone who spouts the "virtues" of creationism, or didn't realize that having a a deep puddle of water on the road lead to their hydroplaning & accident, I just now give them a "Whatever, dude." and walk away instead of trying to explain basic biology or physics. Ten years ago, I wouldn't have done that..today, I just don't care anymore. I actually feel less human for admitting that.
As far as enjoying the benefits of science without even a basic understanding of what makes the thing work..all I can say is that there are probably hundreds of thousands of cellphones and AKs in the hands of people living with a medieval "understanding" of the world. Hell, I've heard that they even use computers and connect to the internet.
friedgreencorrado wrote:
Curmudgeon wrote:
The question about antibiotics reminds me of something which happened to me. I took my daughter in for chest congestion when she was maybe 5 years old. Nothing earth shaking, but with her asthma and her propensity not to let us know she wasn't feeling well a precautionary measure. Diagnosis: mild common cold which is caused by a virus.
The doc said, 'I suppose I need to write a prescription for antibiotics', and I said ''they don't work against viruses so it's pretty much useless to do that'. He looked at me and said '95% of the people who bring their kids in and hear their kid has a virus demand a prescription for antibiotics. You are very well informed'. That was a stunner; I figured with all the various discussions out there it was common knowledge that antbiotics are useless on viruses but effective on bacterial infections such as pneumonia. But people demand their use, even when they are useless and do more harm than good.
Overuse of antibiotics has led to some of the 'superbugs' that docs have to face now. That's a sample of how dangerous ignorance of the basics of science can be and it's going to come back to bite us hard.
I think the thing that scares me the most about your story was that the doc obviously knows about the problem..and has just knuckled under to it.
Maybe I'm blowing it out of proportion, but reading your story reminded me of the first time I read Kornbluth's "The Marching Morons". One of the things that really touched a chord with me then (as a teen in the 70s) was just how stinking **tired** the smart folks had become as they dealt with the stupid. It seemed like they still felt a civic duty to keep society going, but as individuals--they had such a sense of fatigue. I wonder how many other educated people are now doing the same thing as the doctor you mentioned.
I know that when I personally meet someone who spouts the "virtues" of creationism, or didn't realize that having a a deep puddle of water on the road lead to their hydroplaning & accident, I just now give them a "Whatever, dude." and walk away instead of trying to explain basic biology or physics. Ten years ago, I wouldn't have done that..today, I just don't care anymore. I actually feel less human for admitting that.
As far as enjoying the benefits of science without even a basic understanding of what makes the thing work..all I can say is that there are probably hundreds of thousands of cellphones and AKs in the hands of people living with a medieval "understanding" of the world. Hell, I've heard that they even use computers and connect to the internet.
a friend of mine who is a Dr. said that the reason many do knuckle under is because they know that the parents will just go to another Dr. and another, and another ... etc until they get what they want ... and in a small enough town will bad mouth the Dr. enough that it really hurts their effectiveness
I count myself among the intellictual elite. I finished college and I have a certified IQ of 181 (on the old scale where 140+ was genius level) and yes, dealing with the morons (I have known some smart morons, so I am not talking people with lessor IQs here) can really drag you down. It gets especially bad when the realize you are a smart cookie and go looking for advice, which is really affirmation of what they already think.
Modesty and emotional detachment has done wonders for keeping me mostly sane
novaderrik wrote:
science doesn't care what anyone believes... it deals in facts.
......but not all scientists do.....
BTW 13/13 here. Who wants to be a millionaire has harder science questions, that test is lame
HappyAndy wrote:
......but not all scientists do.....
True. Some deal in cash. Unfortunate... but there is certainly a market for seemingly credible studies whenever you have a major profit center conflicting with clean air, water, soil... etc.
This is an issue that only gets worse when you don't have a well informed public who know to be skeptical of studies funded from private small interests. Or even who can tell actual science from junk science.
This is a bit of a threadjack though because the problem isn't just about people not understanding science. It is about special interests muddying the waters so it is hard for anyone to get good information about what is and isn't reliable data. The monopolistic press we have today is great way to influence a bunch of people. If you can get your junk study to play on Reuters and tailor it so talk radio kicks up a storm... whee!
