Last week, a couple of online surveys came to my attention. Both were
from the Pew Research Center (a non-profit, respected group); one was
about public knowledge of science, the other about religion.
If you haven’t taken them, they are very short (13 and 15 questions
each) and will literally only take a couple of minutes for you to fill
out—they don’t ask for any specific personal info, and the questions are
very simply stated. So please, go take them both before you continue
reading here.
OK, all done? How did you do?
Bragging time: I got all the answers right, on both quizzes. But,
apropos of a test on religion, I have a confession: I guessed on the
last religion question; I’m not all that clear on the First Great
Awakening (though I knew it wasn’t Billy Graham, so my odds went up to
50/50 for my guess).
I found the questions and results interesting. I’ll note the
religious test was given out in 2010 (32 questions were used in the
phone survey; only 15 are listed online), but I didn’t find the
questions particularly dated.
Not surprisingly, I was pretty confident in the science test, and
knew my answers were right. I was shakier on some of the religious
questions; I have a broad knowledge of many religions, but specifics not
so much. Still, I did well.
Also not surprisingly, Americans didn’t fare so well in the science
test (maybe we should make members of Congress pass both tests before being allowed to sit on the House Science Committee). But more interesting is which questions were answered incorrectly, and by what percentage; Pew reports the results.
For example, only 20 percent of the respondents were correct in
answering that nitrogen is the most abundant element in our atmosphere
(over three times more abundant than oxygen, which I’d guess is what
most people think makes up the majority of our air). I think people should
know that, in that I think people should have a broad working knowledge
of basic science and its principles. On the other hand, it’s not critically important that people know that. It won’t directly impact their lives, for example.
On the other hand, only 58 percent knew that carbon dioxide causes
rising temperatures. Global warming is a fantastically important issue,
even if you think (incorrectly)
it’s not real. Either way, it’s a big political topic, and one our
economy (and our very lives) depends on. Yet 42 percent of Americans
don’t know the single most basic fact about it.
That’s terrifying.
What I found most fascinating, though, are the percentiles of the
overall surveys; that is, how many people got how many correct total. By
getting all the science questions right, I did better than 93 percent
of the people surveyed (only 7 percent got all 13 questions right). By
getting all the religion questions right, I did better than 99 percent of the people surveyed (only 1 percent got them all right).
Mind you, only a few thousand people were surveyed, there was
probably no overlap between the two groups, and it’s a small number of
questions. Still, this implies something interesting: people know less
about religion than science!
I’m not sure how strong an inference to take here. How do you compare
the two questions? After all, most Americans are supposed to get a
basic science education, but I expect it’s extremely unlikely that most
will get a firm basic knowledge of religions other than their own (and
sometimes not even then). I’d even bet there’s a bias against it, in
fact.
So I wouldn’t read too much into this. It’s just interesting. I
suspect the real impact of this survey is personal. What did you get
right? What did you get wrong? How important is the distinction to you?
I think there’s always room for more learning, and if these surveys
spur that on, even a little bit, then that’s a pretty good thing.
posted by Pieface @ 9:48 AM
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