Years ago I was involved in a conversation in which a co-worker was asked which route (freeway) she took to get to work. She did not know. Because I knew generally where she lived, I piped up: “You take I-70 to work.” “Oh,” she replied, “which one do I take home?”
More recently, I was surprised when I used the work ‘precarious’ and the two people I was speaking with had never heard the word before. So I asked a third nearby person to explain, and she didn’t know either. I spent the next several minutes in search of a single soul who knew the word, and I found not a one.
You mean Fundies Say the Darndest Things? (Too lazy to link it.)
That’s a pretty mind-numbing (but at times hilarious) read.
Also, I just remembered another one.
When I was working at Subway, I was talking to a manager once, and she was reminiscing about old products they’d carried. I told her I thought it would be good if we carried hummus.
She stared at me and said “…is that a kind of bread?”
I mean…I guess in retrospect I can see why she didn’t know that, but it floored me all the same.
I am amazed that young people aren’t taught that when walking in a public area, if someone is coming from the opposite direction you keep to the right to avoid collisions. Do they think this only applies when driving?
Sometimes one is blinded by one’s own perspective and experience. Or at least this seems to be true for me. I have a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering, and work with a bunch of similarly overeducated folks. I have an interest in all sorts of technology and machinery, and just generally enjoy understanding things.
Some things are good to understand because they help ensure your survival and minimize expenses. The other day the news folks were talking about icy roads, and showed several scenes of people skidding sideways in their cars. The front wheels on these skidding cars were pretty much pointed straight toward the front of the car, i.e. the drivers were making no attempt to steer into the skid and regain any semblance of control over the vehicle. Now that most cars are front wheel drive, do driver-education instructors think this is not so important? Do parents these days no longer take their kids to an empty, snowy parking lot and show them how to straighten out once the car gets sideways?
That’s going to vary with where people learn to drive, as well as with different instructors or parents. I could see it not being emphasized so much in, say, Florida or California. Just as a practical matter, an empty, snowy parking lot is going to be harder to come by there than it would be in, say, North Dakota.
Of course, just because someone is taught something doesn’t mean they retain it. That’s true of driving skills just like it is for pretty much everything else. And just because you know something doesn’t mean you automatically apply it in a stressful situation (which skidding in your car is, for a lot of people). People panic and don’t do what they should.
We have a Swedish post-doc on our floor, we intentionally confuse Sweden and Switzerland just to bug him. It was all fun and games until an undergrad repeatedly had the two confused and kept asking Patrik if he lived in the Alps…
When I was a little kid, the show “The Monkees” was on Sunday mornings. This was pre-cable, so kids were desperate. Anyway, I could never keep the four of them straight. Fast-forward 30 years or so, and I’m watching the opening credits, and for all four of them, they label them “Mickey”. Dammit.
That’s why they always draw a border around the map.
No, that’s pretty much all people regardless of age. I run into this (sometimes literally ) all the time when out running.
Also, that people have absolutely no idea what “On your left” means. Apparently in some language I’m not aware of, it actually means “Stop, turn around, and stare blankly.” (You’d think self-preservation would kick in at some point, but apparently this is not so.)
Thanks for that link. Although I know where pineapples come from that is by far the best photo I’ve ever seen of one. I’ve never seen one that close up, and always pictured them closer to the ground, similar to maybe cabbage.
As to the We Are the World, by the time I got to the video link and watched it I’d read enough comments to be tipped off to who was in it, so I’m sure I had an unfair advantage when it came to put names to faces. Who was that one white girl with the bad bleached hair, was that Linda McCartney? She was harsh looking. Not Cindy Lauper, she’s adorable, but the one that sang with her.
) all the time when out running.