Re: Most popular/common dinosaur misconceptions

[don ohmes <d_ohmes@yahoo.com>]

Or 28%, knowing BAD, said "true". And 51%, thinking they meant BAND, sez 
"false". And that leaves only 22% unqualified to vote or own property...

Ya gotta look at the bright side.

Have a Happy Pollyannakkuh,

Don


----- Original Message ----
From: Phillip Bigelow <bigelowp@juno.com>
To: dinosaur@usc.edu
Sent: Friday, August 18, 2006 9:11:19 AM
Subject: Re: Most popular/common dinosaur misconceptions

Jeff Hecht <jeff@jeffhecht.com> writes:

> It's worth noting that one of the questions used to assess people's 
> understanding of evolution in surveys recently described in Science 
> is a true-false:
> 
> "The earliest humans lived at the same time as the dinosaurs."  To 
> which 28% answered true, 22% said not sure, and  51% said false.


Actually, that test statement *doesn't* assess one's understanding of
evolution.  Carefully re-read the statement.  Nowhere does it address the
concept of descent with modification.
The statement *actually* assesses people's beliefs in religion or belief
in other institutional mythologies.


> If 
> paleonotologists change the rules and start calling birds 
> "dinosaurs", expect the confusion factor to soar among the public.


In fairness, the public's confusion over ancestor-descendant
relationships was already blazing along long before Ostrom and Bakker
revived the idea about birds as dinos.  I doubt that any ground was lost.


> And if you want to look at the public messiness of redefinition of 
> scientific concepts, go read what's happening with astronomers' 
> efforts to redefine what is a planet.


I think the public is coddled way too much in this regard.  Instead, if
we actually held the public to higher expectations, perhaps we could
raise the science literacy bar a bit higher.

I learned "Set Theory" in 4th grade math (remember when we had to draw
circles around groups of interrelated objects?).  It doesn't take a
person with a high IQ to understand that a chair is also a piece of
furnature, and that a piece of furnature is also a house furnishing.

<pb>
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