Some hard science-related news for you now. Try this: name a scientist. Go ahead, name one, any one. If you’re like me the first name that pops into your head is Bill Nye or Michio Kaku. And if you’re also like me you can name several others. The average American? Not so much. USA Today ran a little poll a few days ago asking Americans to name a scientist, and a whopping 23 percent of respondents couldn’t name one. That’s right: 23 percent of the people USA Today asked couldn’t name a single scientist, living or dead, famous or obscure. And only 47 percent could so much as muster the name “Albert Einstein”! What person, let alone American, couldn’t come up with the name “Albert Einstein”?
The full results of the poll are as follows. When asked to name a scientist, these names were uttered with the corresponding frequency:
47 percent named Albert Einstein
23 percent could not name anyone
6 percent named Marie Curie
4 percent named Louis Pasteur
4 percent named Thomas Edison
I would imagine that you guys would be able to come up with more than one name, being fans of tech and all. The fact that Nikola Tesla isn’t even on that list is terribly disappointing, but not necessarily shocking. To me, there just seems to be a general lack of interest in science in this country. The average Joe would rather watch “Dance Your Ass Off” than read a book about the creation of the atomic bomb, or watch a documentary on genetics or whatever.
Who wants to help me found a real lifeCity of Rapture?
Only 20% of adults graduate from college. While that doesn’t mean the 80% that are left over are idiots… half of those probably are….so 40% of our country is stupid. Roughly Half. Makes you wanna go do something stupid and join the rest right?
I wonder how many people offered up “Doc Brown”?
Even the Nobel Prize Awards are media fodder annually and should help people come up with names.
I’m a Canuck so here’s two local ones from Vancouver, Michael Smith and David Suzuki.
Alexander Fleming? These ‘people’ couldn’t name the being responsible for discovering possibly the biggest medical breakthrough of the 20th century… ala people not dying from cuts anymore?
Tesla’s property is for sale in Shoreham NY for 1.6 million if your interested. And they want to bulldoze it.. Maybe thats because nobody cares anymore
Was Edison a scientist? Tesla might not have agreed.
Inventor. Big Difference.
who cares about scientist names…
that doesn’t matter at all…
its the cool stuff they worked on that is good to know….
Darwin? Mr. Wizard? Sagan? sigh…
Bill Nigh the science guy!
i know!! i know!! there are plenty of those in america!! they even made it to the magazines!!
Dr Doom, Dr Octopus, David Banner, Dr Ross, Mr Fantastic, Young Apprentice-Peter Parker.. the lot!!
easy peasy!! haha!!
Americans are too busy “paying Jesus”, trying to push creationism in schools, and stocking up for the next big world ending event in 2012 to care about science.
…and nobody mentioned Hawkings? Shame on you :)
Dr No…
It’s not however said about the details of the poll…
I can’t fully trust it just because it’s about Americans.
Is it sad I knew it was Tesla right off? Naa… Just educated…
Edison was an inventor not a scientist. He invented products to work with existing technologies.
Charles Darwin traveled to the Galapagos on a ship named Beagle in 1831 to 1836