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Forum: Internet Links Topic: Americans fail science started by: Malcolm Posted by Malcolm on Sep. 11 2015,10:28
< HAHAHAHAHA >. A "D" technically isn't failing, but back in uni, any grade in a hard science class below "C" wasn't accepted.
Posted by GORDON on Sep. 11 2015,10:48
Some Americans fail science. Of the questions they listed in TFA, I knew all of them.I'd guess about 90% of Americans would not get 100% of the questions correct. Posted by Malcolm on Sep. 11 2015,10:58
QUOTE More than 1 in 5 (22 percent) of those taking the test said astronomy was “the study of how the positions of stars and planets can influence human behavior.” The answer they should have given was astrology. That should constitute failure right there. Posted by Alhazad on Sep. 11 2015,13:43
(Malcolm @ Sep. 11 2015,10:58) QUOTE QUOTE More than 1 in 5 (22 percent) of those taking the test said astronomy was “the study of how the positions of stars and planets can influence human behavior.” The answer they should have given was astrology. That should constitute failure right there. Both answers are wrong, as is the question. There is no "study", only generalizations that encourage self-sorting. Posted by Malcolm on Sep. 11 2015,14:51
(Alhazad @ Sep. 11 2015,15:43) QUOTE (Malcolm @ Sep. 11 2015,10:58) QUOTE QUOTE More than 1 in 5 (22 percent) of those taking the test said astronomy was “the study of how the positions of stars and planets can influence human behavior.” The answer they should have given was astrology. That should constitute failure right there. Both answers are wrong, as is the question. There is no "study", only generalizations that encourage self-sorting. After further thought, astronomy is the correct answer, even though they don't intend it to be. If you interpret "stars and planets" to be "any celestial body," you can argue the moon influences tides influences us. Even if you take the phrase literally, one can argue our behaviour is influenced by the position of the sun relative to our planet. Posted by Alhazad on Sep. 11 2015,14:59
(Malcolm @ Sep. 11 2015,14:51) QUOTE After further thought, astronomy is the correct answer, even though they don't intend it to be. If you interpret "stars and planets" to be "any celestial body," you can argue the moon influences tides influences us. Even if you take the phrase literally, one can argue our behaviour is influenced by the position of the sun relative to our planet. So the real answer would be that branch of astronomy that intersects with human behavior. 'Celestial navigation'? Posted by Malcolm on Sep. 11 2015,15:00
Think of all the times they tide has influenced a construction project, battle at some point in time, etc. We didn't know how/why tides happened until we started doing serious physics and astronomy. We have, by definition, understood how the moon influenced our history and engineering. The relative position of the sun to the Earth is what allows life to exist, something we also didn't know until astronomy, and that helps along biology which helps along anthropology. Without astronomy, we wouldn't know exactly how seasons work. If that last bit hasn't directed humanity's development, I don't know what has. How about all the big-ass monuments ancient societies built to function as sophisticated calendars? Lots of man-hours have gone into those things, all for the purpose of tracking things in the sky. Did they attribute some bullshit to those movements? Sure. Gods weren't chasing each other across the heavens doing battle every day, that's just dawn and dusk. They probably also knew when the growing and harvesting seasons were coming, as well as winter, thanks to the stars. They navigated the oceans by the stars.Whoever wrote the question was also stupid. Posted by Alhazad on Sep. 11 2015,15:26
So, the correct answer to "What is the study of how the positions of stars and planets can influence human behavior?" would be anthropology.
Posted by TPRJones on Sep. 11 2015,15:53
Theology
Posted by Alhazad on Sep. 11 2015,15:55
(TPRJones @ Sep. 11 2015,15:53) QUOTE Theology No, stars and planets are real. Posted by TPRJones on Sep. 11 2015,16:02
Their influence on the daily lives of individual humans is not real. Not in the way the question was apparently intended.
Posted by Alhazad on Sep. 11 2015,16:45
The sun is a star though.
Posted by TPRJones on Sep. 11 2015,17:18
It's position has no bearing, however.
Posted by Alhazad on Sep. 11 2015,18:28
I know you're not stupid, so I'm going to assume I don't understand your point.
Posted by Malcolm on Sep. 11 2015,21:01
(TPRJones @ Sep. 11 2015,19:18) QUOTE It's position has no bearing, however. Bah. There are approximately 93M reasons why the position of the sun is important. Posted by TPRJones on Sep. 11 2015,21:04
No there aren't. There's 93M reasons why the current rotational attitude of the earth is important. The position of the sun has nothing to do with where it appears in our sky. Contrary to the opinion of some, the sun is not rotating around the earth. EDIT: Yeah, I'm a real pain in the ass lately. The nits, I pick 'em. But given the original purpose of this discussion I think this particular nit is somewhat appropriate. Posted by Malcolm on Sep. 11 2015,21:08
I don't give a fuck where it appears in the sky. I care about its proximity to the planet and that it's somewhere between too close and too far.
Posted by TPRJones on Sep. 11 2015,21:13
Technically still more about the position of the earth than that of the sun.
Posted by GORDON on Sep. 11 2015,21:31
I heard somewhere that the Moon doesn't orbit the Earth. It orbits the Sun along with the Earth.
Posted by Alhazad on Sep. 11 2015,21:33
(TPRJones @ Sep. 11 2015,21:04) QUOTE No there aren't. There's 93M reasons why the current rotational attitude of the earth is important. The position of the sun has nothing to do with where it appears in our sky. Contrary to the opinion of some, the sun is not rotating around the earth. EDIT: Yeah, I'm a real pain in the ass lately. The nits, I pick 'em. But given the original purpose of this discussion I think this particular nit is somewhat appropriate. The earth is not really orbiting the sun, either, but I'm not pedantic enough to point it out. And because the earth orbits elliptically, the sun's varying position is slightly important, especially to sundial societies. And like Mal implied, if something (rogue supermassive hole) should lengthen or shorten the orbit of the sun or earth, we'd be pretty fucked. Posted by TPRJones on Sep. 11 2015,21:45
(Alhazad @ Sep. 11 2015,23:33) QUOTE The earth is not really orbiting the sun, either... Point. But the barycenter is inside the sun, so it's roughly the same thing. Posted by Alhazad on Sep. 11 2015,21:58
I think it's outside right now, or was recently.Back on topic, it'd be impossible for the two to relate to each other if the sun had no position, so I'd say the sun's position is dreadfully important -- at least equal to Earth's. Plus hey, Earth is a planet anyway, so its position also counts for the definition. Move the goalpost and call the game. Posted by TPRJones on Sep. 11 2015,23:17
Well, the definition did say planets - as in more than one - so which other planet is important to the our daily lives?Take that! Posted by thibodeaux on Sep. 12 2015,05:40
Did we decide if astronomy is even a science? They don't do no reproducible experiments.
Posted by Alhazad on Sep. 12 2015,06:48
(TPRJones @ Sep. 11 2015,23:17) QUOTE Well, the definition did say planets - as in more than one - so which other planet is important to the our daily lives? Take that! Theia. Posted by Malcolm on Sep. 12 2015,07:36
(Alhazad @ Sep. 12 2015,08:48) QUOTE (TPRJones @ Sep. 11 2015,23:17) QUOTE Well, the definition did say planets - as in more than one - so which other planet is important to the our daily lives? Take that! Theia. Boom. So's Jupiter because it's influenced Christ only knows how many asteroid orbits. Hell, if there's no Jupiter, dinosaurs might have evolved into the sentient species. Posted by GORDON on Sep. 12 2015,09:27
(thibodeaux @ Sep. 12 2015,08:40) QUOTE Did we decide if astronomy is even a science? They don't do no reproducible experiments. Hmmm. There's lots of observation and theorizing, but. Is driving a rover on Mars considered to be ASTROnomy? Not by strict definition. Posted by Malcolm on Sep. 12 2015,09:49
If experiments have to be conducted in an ultra controlled lab environment, then astronomy's going to have a difficult time.
Posted by TPRJones on Sep. 12 2015,10:29
While you can't do reproducible lab experiments in astronomy (at least not yet), you can still use observations to form theories that include predictions that can be disprovable with further observations. I think that counts.All because we don't yet have the technology to perform reproducible lab experiments in the field doesn't mean they are impossible to ever be performed. |