modified - edited - adapted from --
source: one minute readings: issues in S-T-S; R. F. Brinckerhoff -- addison-wesley -- 1992

Issue 78 -- Popular Ideas about Science

To compare your attitude toward science with the views of 2000 American adults tested in 1985 by Jon D. Miller, head of the Public Opinion Laboratory at Northern Illinois University, answer the following questions ( true or false ).

1. Some numbers are especially lucky for some people. ( 40 )

2. Because of their knowledge, scientific researchers have a power that makes them dangerous. ( 50+ )

3. The positions of the sun, moon, planets, and stars have at least some influence on human affairs (astrology). ( 40 )

4. It is likely that some of the unidentified flying objects (UFOs) that have been reported are really space vehicles from other civilizations. ( 43 )

5. Space shots have caused changes in our weather. ( 40+ )

6. Science tends to break down people's ideas of right and wrong. ( over 30 )

Of the 2000 test takers, the % answering "true" is in parentheses after each question.

Ideally, the numbers should all be zero (0) since all the statements are false.

Assuming the sample was a fair cross section of adult Americans, what do these numbers show about attitudes toward science ?

Compared with them, how well did you do ?

In another poll reported in The American Biology Teacher ( editorial, May '89 )

34 % thought psychic powers could be used to read people's thoughts,
29 % felt we could communicate with the dead, and
22 % believed in ghosts.

The sample being polled consisted of high school life science and biology teachers !

adapted / modified / edited from -- source:
one minute readings: issues in S-T-S -- Richard F. Brinckerhoff -- addison-wesley --'92

Issue 79 -- Astrology

A Gallup poll in 1984 indicated that 52% of American teens believed that astrology works.
Astrology columns appear in over 1200 U.S. newspapers.
Does this mean that astrology should be taken seriously ?

Consider some of the evidence and some pointed questions:

What is the likelihood that 1 / 12th of the world's population is having the same kind of day ?
Leyden note:
Let's say there are 6 billion people on the planet with an average life span of 60 yrs (far too high for most of the world) --- so that means 274,000 people were born each day -- or about 1/2 billion each month who have the same "sign."
Why is the moment of birth, not conception, crucial for casting a horoscope ?
If astrologers are as good as they claim to be, why aren't they richer ?
Are all horoscopes that were done before the discovery of the three outer planets incorrect ?
Why do different schools of astrology so strongly disagree with one another ?

If astrologers claim that your personality is dictated by the attraction of the planets at the moment of your birth, how do you account for the fact that the gravitational pull of the delivering obstetrician far outweighed that of the planets involved ?

After the San Francisco earthquake in October 1989, Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen found that Nancy Reagan's much-publicized astrologer had been home in San Francisco.

"What I want to know is why a woman who told the president the precise moment to sign a treaty couldn't see an earthquake coming," he wrote. Alas, she said, that kind of prediction is best left to an earthquake astrologer. ( "In Brief," Skeptical Inquirer, Spring 1990, p. 239. )

Should people who believe in astrology be allowed to teach science in public schools, practice medicine, or hold public office ?
Would you vote for such a person if you had the choice ?

12 / 18m / 95

Issue 80 -- Science and Non-Science

Which of these items are supported by == scientific evidence ?

== popular tradition with little or no scientific evidence ?

How do you tell the difference ?

Bermuda triangle

extra-sensory perception ( ESP )

acupuncture

horning instinct in

pigeons

astrology

prediction of eclipses

astronomy

flat (or hollow) earth

biorhythms

continental drift

UFOs

pyramid power

creationism

evolution of species