Shocking Scientific Literacy Poll

Or How to Measure the Height of a Skyscraper

Last week the National Science Foundation released its Science and Engineering Indicators report which includes the results of a scientific literacy poll which reveals levels of scientific ignorance that are being called shocking. The poll, which the NSF calls “high-quality,” is a “major source of data” for the NSF report. One question about heliocentrism and geocentrism (“Does the Earth go around the sun, or does the sun go around the Earth?”) is drawing attention from journalists and commentators because one in four American got it wrong. But amidst all the hand wringing and calls for more funding there is one minor issue: the scientific literacy poll is itself scientifically illiterate.

It is said that he who defines the terms wins the debate. Nowhere is that more true with evolution and this scientific literacy poll is a good example. As the NSF puts it, the poll asks “factual knowledge questions.” And just what is a factual knowledge question? What are the truths that Americans ought to know?

One of them is that lasers do not work by focusing sound waves, but rather light waves. It seems that half of Americans don’t know this. Perhaps this is because lasers not only are quite complicated, but they come in a tremendous variety of types. In fact there are lasers that, yes, focus sound waves.

Another “truth” that we are supposed to know is that it is the father's gene that decides whether the baby is a boy or girl. The only problem is this isn’t true. Sex determination varies between species and, like most of biology, defies rules.

Another question asks about continental drift: “The continents have been moving their location for millions of years and will continue to move.” We are supposed to say this is true, but science doesn’t know the future.

Of course there is the mandatory evolution question. We must agree that “Human beings, as we know them today, developed from earlier species of animals.” But that is a religiously-driven claim that goes against science.

And what about the heliocentrism versus geocentrism question? It is a non scientific false dichotomy. The Earth does not “go around the sun,” any more than does the “sun go around the Earth.”

That is because neither statement makes sense. In order to make a meaningful statement about what goes around what, one first needs to specify a frame of reference. For an observer on the sun, the Earth circles the sun. And for an observer on Earth, the sun circles the Earth. That is “factual knowledge.” When the weatherman gives the sunrise time he is not guilty of scientific illiteracy. What Copernicus, Galileo and Newton showed is that the Earth circles the sun once a year in a sun-fixed inertial frame and that the sun does not circle the Earth once a day in an Earth-fixed inertial frame.

With evolution science has become a vehicle used to advocate beliefs. In the process science is diluted and mediocrity is rewarded. All of this reminds us of simple-minded exam question about how to measure the height of a skyscraper with a barometer. The “correct” answer has to do with using the barometer to compare the air pressure at the street level and on the roof of the skyscraper, and using those measurements to compute the vertical distance between the two points.

But the young physics student who was far more creative than the dull professor wrote that one could tie a string to the instrument and lower it from the roof until it touched the sidewalk below. Then measure the string.

Or better yet, one could drop the instrument from the roof and measure the seconds to impact. Square the value, divide by two, and multiply by 32.174 to get the height in feet.

Or if one wanted to avoid the liability of striking pedestrians below, one could approach the janitor of the building, explaining to him that you will give him this very nice, expensive instrument if he will tell you the height of the skyscraper.