# Interesting Science Quiz **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [January 12, 2012, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238 "2012-01-12T00:31:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![jharvey963](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/54ee81/32.png) [@jharvey963](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jharvey963)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/1 "2012-01-12T00:31:47Z")
Just found this quiz: [Science Quiz](http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2011/1209/Are-you-scientifically-literate-Take-our-quiz/Composing-about-78-percent-of-the-air-at-sea-level-what-is-the-most-common-gas-in-the-Earth-s-atmosphere) It was much harder than I expected. I thought I was reasonably science-astute, but I only got 36 out of 50. J. ---
**Author:** ![detop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bcef8e/32.png) [@detop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/detop)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/2 "2012-01-12T00:57:34Z")
40 out of 50 ---
**Author:** ![IvoryTowerDenizen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ivorytowerdenizen/32/17937_2.png) [@IvoryTowerDenizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IvoryTowerDenizen)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/3 "2012-01-12T00:57:56Z")
42/50, missed a couple by answering too fast. Pretty tough! ---
**Author:** ![The\_Man\_With\_The\_Golden\_Gun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/dc4da7/32.png) [@The\_Man\_With\_The\_Golden\_Gun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Man_With_The_Golden_Gun)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 1:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/4 "2012-01-12T01:32:18Z")
42/50. I did a lot better than I was expecting, considering I got the second question wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Greg\_Charles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/839c29/32.png) [@Greg\_Charles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Greg_Charles)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/5 "2012-01-12T01:38:30Z")
44/50. A couple of them surprised me. Why is the gravity on Mars so low? ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/6 "2012-01-12T01:43:21Z")
39/50. I kept screwing up on those lame-ass derived units from physics. (Seriously, who the hell remembers what a newton is once you pass the final? Bah!) ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/7 "2012-01-12T01:44:22Z")
> [@Greg\_Charles](#): > > 44/50. A couple of them surprised me. > > Why is the gravity on Mars so low? It’s smaller than most people think. (That’s what she said.) ---
**Author:** ![D18](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c57346/32.png) [@D18](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D18)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/8 "2012-01-12T02:10:41Z")
40/50. ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/9 "2012-01-12T02:26:36Z")
44/50 Missed the postage stamp one, and one that I should have known - if I hadn’t taken my last Physics class 30 years ago… ---
**Author:** ![Angua](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8baadc/32.png) [@Angua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Angua)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/10 "2012-01-12T02:39:21Z")
> [@friedo](#): > > 39/50. I kept screwing up on those lame-ass derived units from physics. (Seriously, who the hell remembers what a newton is once you pass the final? Bah!) The person grading your final. 😉 45 here. I got a couple of the biology and geology ones wrong. And why do I care about cloud classification? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/11 "2012-01-12T02:43:46Z")
42/50 ---
**Author:** ![steronz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steronz/32/11765_2.png) [@steronz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/steronz)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 2:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/12 "2012-01-12T02:55:28Z")
1. Kicking myself on some of them. Also, that’s the most annoying website ever. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/13 "2012-01-12T02:57:22Z")
47 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![RadicalPi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/radicalpi/32/9806_2.png) [@RadicalPi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RadicalPi)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/14 "2012-01-12T03:10:09Z")
I got all of them, but I did have to guess on three of them: 1. The tied-for-last in terms of surface gravity one. 2. The Greek letter used for the coefficient of friction one. 3. The Athena one. That’s better luck than I usually have. Anyway, some of the questions, though, I don’t think address scientific literacy all that well. The origin of the word “quark” seems to be of no importance, really. And the questions about _e_ and uneven triangles are really more about math. Also, I think knowing who discovered what and what ideas are named after who is not particularly important for scientific literacy. Like the question on redshift should have been more on what redshift is exactly and what that means about the universe and not on whose name is attached to the idea. ---
**Author:** ![Giles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giles/32/60_2.png) [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/15 "2012-01-12T03:11:30Z")
47/50 – I found knowing a bit of Latin and Greek was a help. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/16 "2012-01-12T03:11:38Z")
47/50. Rather better than I expected, to be honest. ---
**Author:** ![Jenaroph](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e8c25b/32.png) [@Jenaroph](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jenaroph)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/17 "2012-01-12T03:14:17Z")
44/50. And there was one I knew, just clicked the wrong answer, 14 trillion instead of 14 billion. ---
**Author:** ![Snarky\_Kong](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a183cd/32.png) [@Snarky\_Kong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snarky_Kong)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/18 "2012-01-12T03:17:05Z")
Why the fuck do you have to click twice for each question? Answer once, compile at the end! 41/50 ---
**Author:** ![Dag\_Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@Dag\_Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dag_Otto)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/19 "2012-01-12T03:18:39Z")
1. The chemistry\* and physics were cake, but the biology questions killed me.My confidence on those was 25%. The unit questions were the easy ones. \*except the chemistry questions that I could have easily answered if I had a periodic table in front of me. I missed most of those. I’m not sure if that would be cheating or not. If you were really science illiterate then having a periodic table in front of you wouldn’t help, would it? ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Il\_Palazzo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Lord\_Il\_Palazzo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Il_Palazzo)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2012, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238/20 "2012-01-12T03:20:03Z")
> [@Giles](#): > > 47/50 – I found knowing a bit of Latin and Greek was a help. My thoughts (and score) exactly. I picked up a couple that would otherwise have been 1/2 or 1/3 guesses based on Greek and Latin roots in the answers (the “Good Kernal” question comes to mind.) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/interesting-science-quiz/609238.md?page=2)