Just for fun, I thought I'd cook up a science literacy test for folks to see how well-informed they are about scientific concepts, theories, and facts. We're a pretty intelligent and well-educated group here, so I doubt the results would track with national trends, but it's still fun to see where people are in understanding their universe.
1. Light is...
a) A wave.
b) A particle.
c) An extensor.
d) A proteron.
e) a and b - a wave and a particle.
f) a and c - a wave and an extensor.
g) a and d - a wave and a proteron.
h) b and c - a particle and an extensor.
i) b and d - a particle and a proteron.
f) None of the above.
2.
Light is an example of...
a) Refractive potential.
b) Electrical charge.
c) Reflection.
d) Electromagnetic radiation.
e) Nuclear fission.
f) a and b - both a refractive potential and electrical charge.
g) e and c - both reflection and nuclear fission.
3.
Which of the following is NOT a fundamental force:
a) Weak nuclear.
b) Inertia.
c) Gravity.
d) Strong nuclear.
e) Electromagnetism.
f) They are all forces.
4.
What is the relationship between electricity and magnetism?
a) There is none.
b) They are the same thing.
d) They are carried by the same particle.
e) Change in one causes the other.
f) b and d.
g) d and e.
5.
Gravity is determined by...
a) Mass and distance.
b) Mass and electrical charge.
c) Weight and distance.
d) Weight and electrical charge.
e) Momentum and shape.
f) Weight and momentum.
g) None of the above.
6.
Roughly how old is the universe under current theory?
a) 6,000 years
b) 102,690 years
c) 20.3 million years
d) 2.2 billion years
e) 13.7 billion years
f) 44.9 billion years
g) 1.35 trillion years
7.
Roughly how old is planet Earth under current theory?
a) 6,000 years
b) 67,000 years
c) 65 million years
d) 4.5 billion years
e) 7.2 billion yeas
f) 11.8 billion years
g) 14.4 billion years
8.
Ceres, Pluto, and Eris are all examples of what type of astronomical body?
a) Comets.
b) Asteroids.
c) Dwarf planets.
d) Planets.
e) Trojan swarm objects.
d) Moons.
e) Stars.
9.
Which is hotter: An A-type star or a B-type star?
a) A
b) B
c) They are the same temperature.
d) You're just making this up.
10.
What type of location do Trojan asteroids definitively occupy?
a) Planetary surfaces.
b) Linear Lagrange points.
c) Triangular Lagrange points.
d) Polar orbits of stars.
e) Ring planes of ring-bearing gas giant planets.
11.
Alpha Centauri is...
a) A star.
b) A triple-star system.
c) A stellar cluster of several dozen stars.
d) A small galaxy.
12.
What galaxy are we in?
a) The Milky Way
b) Andromeda
c) M51
d) Other
13.
Where are we located in this galaxy?
a) Perseus Arm
b) Outer Arm
c) Scutum-Centaurus Arm
d) Orion Spur
e) Central Hub
d) Galactic Bar
14.
What comes next in this sequence? Milli, micro, nano...
a) Pico
b) Deci
c) Decka
d) Femto
e) Tera
f) Oppo
15.
Protons and neutrons are composed of...
a) Opposite electrical charges.
b) Atoms
c) Molecules
d) Electromagnetic radiation
e) Quarks
16.
How does the mass of a proton compare with that of a neutron?
a) They are the same.
b) The proton is much more massive than a neutron.
c) The proton is slightly more massive than the neutron.
d) The neutron is slightly more massive than the proton.
e) The neutron is much more massive than the proton.
f) Science does not yet know.
17.
What is a theory?
a) A guess.
b) An educated supposition.
c) A self-consistent model used to explain the past and predict the future.
d) A specific prediction of the outcome of an experiment.
18.
When a prediction fails in a correctly-performed experiment...
a) The prediction was based on faulty assumptions.
b) The experimenter had insufficient faith in their conclusions.
c) God is confounding their prideful inquisitiveness.
19.
Which of the following is NOT a fundamental axiom of science:
a) Occam's Razor.
b) Empiricism.
c) Newton's Laws of Motion
d) Logic.
e) Causality.
20.
What is the main component of Earth's atmosphere?
a) Oxygen.
b) Carbon dioxide.
c) Nitrogen.
d) Argon
e) Water vapor.
21.
The branch of taxonomy dealing with evolutionary descent is called...
a) Evolutionary taxonomy.
b) Genetic hierarchy.
c) Biopatterning.
d) Cladistics.
e) None of the above.
22.
What is the ultimate source of energy for life on Earth?
a) Nuclear fusion in the Sun's core.
b) Digestion of organic material.
c) Respiration of atmospheric gases.
d) Gravitational pull of the Earth.
e) Luminiferous aether.
f) God.
23.
Exclusively under high pressure and temperature, a substance enters a phase of fluid distinct from both liquid and gas. What is this phase called?
a) Plasma.
b) Quark-gluon state.
c) Supercritical.
d) Degenerate matter.
24.
How do atoms primarily interact?
a) Giving, receiving, sharing, or repelling electrons.
b) Fusing or fissioning nuclei into subatomic particles.
c) Forming rigid structures with electrons in fixed locations.
d) Gravitational attraction.
e) Attract and repel via magnetic fields.
25.
What would happen to a beam of light that enters the event horizon of a black hole directly tangent to it?
a) It would spiral inward toward the central singularity, since light cannot escape a black hole's gravity.
b) Its energy would be absorbed by the black hole.
c) It would circle the event horizon forever, provided the horizon does not expand.
d) There are currently no theories at to this scenario.
26.
What was the dominant / most advanced form of land animal life on Earth during the Triassic period?
a) Pterosaurs
b) Therapsids
c) Dinosaurs
d) Giant insects
27.
Why do astronauts in Earth orbit float?
a) There is no gravity in space.
b) Gravity is very small at their altitude, so they do not experience much of it.
c) Because being in orbit means falling in a circle that never reaches the surface.
d) Firing rockets counters Earth's gravity, so those inside spacecraft are not exposed to it.
e) It is an optical illusion.
28.
What part of Earth's atmosphere protects the surface from ultraviolet radiation?
a) Stratosphere
b) Magnetosphere
c) Aurora Borealis
d) Mesospheric cloud layer
e) Ozone Layer
d) The different layers contribute more or less equally.
29.
What phenomenon protects the Earth's surface from the solar wind and cosmic rays?
a) Lightning.
b) Magnetosphere.
c) Ozone Layer.
d) Cirrus clouds.
e) Trade winds.
30.
Longer wavelengths of light are [__] as/than shorter wavelengths.
a) More energetic
b) Less energetic
c) The same energy
31.
All human experiences such as thoughts, emotions, memories, desires, pain, pleasure, love, hate, fear, etc...
a) Are caused by quantum probability effects in the brain producing infinite complexity.
b) Occur because we have souls.
c) Are caused by finite electro-chemical reactions on the molecular level in the brain.
d) Are finite electro-chemical reactions on the molecular level in the brain.
e) Result from a mystical spiritual plane that connects all consciousness.
32.
After death, humans...
a) Go to a magical wonderland if they were righteous in life, or a nightmarish place of pain and torture if they were wicked.
b) Transcend our plane of existence and enter places of unknown wonder.
c) Join with a universal consciousness and live omniscient for eternity.
d) Are consumed by opportunistic microbes.
33.
Prior to gestation, a human...
a) Is a latent soul waiting in heaven to be embodied.
b) Is part of the universal consciousness that has not yet manifested into a new individual.
c) Does not yet exist, because the constituent materials of a human have not yet combined to form one.
34.
Time is...
a) An immutable law of nature.
b) A force.
c) The ratio of change in something compared to the change in something else.
d) Not a scientific property.
35.
What are the molecular building blocks of RNA and DNA?
a) Genes.
b) Proteins.
c) Peptides.
d) Nucleotides.
e) Lipids.
36.
Atoms of the same element may have different numbers of neutrons. These are called ___ of that element.
a) Telomeres.
b) Isotopes.
c) Molecules.
d) Valences.
d) Ions.
37.
Mitochondria are examples of...
a) Viral pathogens
b) Photosynthesis
c) Fat storage
d) Parasitism
e) Symbiosis
38.
What will the Sun become when it dies?
a) Brown dwarf
b) White dwarf
c) Neutron star
d) Black hole
39.
Why is water a solvent?
a) Water molecules are polar.
b) All liquids are solvents.
c) It is highly ionized.
d) The molecules are small enough to infiltrate more complicated chemicals.
e) It is not a solvent.
40. The universe is...
a) Collapsing at an accelerating rate.
b) Collapsing at a constant rate.
c) Collapsing at a decreasing rate.
d) Remaining constant in size.
e) Expanding at a decreasing rate.
f) Expanding at a constant rate.
g) Expanding at an accelerating rate.
h) Diverging into multiple universes at an accelerating rate.
i) Diverging into multiple universes at a constant rate.
j) Diverging into multiple universe at a decreasing rate.
k) Merging with other universes at an accelerating rate.
l) Merging with other universes at a constant rate.
m) Merging with other universes at a decreasing rate.
41.
One of these things is not like the others.
a) Rhea
b) Triton
c) Io
d) Phobos
e) Ganymede
f) Iapetus
g) Titan
42.
About how many planets are confirmed to exist today?
a) 8
b) 9
c) 41
d) 315
e) 763
f) 3,790
43.
True or False: Most humans alive today have some Neanderthal DNA.
a) True
b) False
c) Results have been inconclusive.
44.
How did the Moon form?
a) It formed independently of Earth and was subsequently captured into orbit.
b) It was originally the moon of another planet that escaped and was captured by Earth.
c) A giant impact in the early history of Earth blew off a large chunk of mantle into orbit.
d) It formed alongside Earth from the same material.
45.
What causes ocean tides?
a) Wind.
b) The Moon.
c) The Sun.
d) a and b - Wind and the Moon.
e) a and c - Wind and the Sun.
f) b and c - The Moon and the Sun.
g) None of the above.
46.
Earth bulges at the equator. Why?
a) It is pulled by the Sun's gravity.
b) The crust at the poles is heavier and squeezes the planet into an oblong shape.
c) Tides are more powerful at the equator.
d) The rotation of the Earth flattens it slightly due to centrifugal force.
e) No such phenomenon occurs.
47.
Why is the Earth slowly spiraling inward toward Sun?
a) Its collision with the solar wind is slowing it down, causing orbital decay.
b) Tidal acceleration causes drag on its orbit.
c) Gravitational influence from Jupiter is nudging it inward.
d) It isn't. You're making that up.
48.
What is plasma?
a) A greenish organic substance found primarily in swamplands.
b) A state of matter energized to the point of stripping nuclei of all electrons.
c) The top layer of a plastic.
d) A liquid suspension found in blood.
e) A bluish-white energy discharge.
f) a and b.
g) a and c.
h) a and d.
i) a and e.
j) b and c.
k) b and d.
l) b and e.
m) c and d.
n) c and e.
o) d and e.
p) None of the above.
49.
A recently-used metal skillet is hot, but not hot enough to visibly glow. What wavelenth of electromagnetic radiation is it mainly emitting?
a) Radio
b) Infrared
c) Ultraviolet
d) Gamma rays
50.
Which of the following substances is NOT known to cause significant health problems in adults:
a) Marijuana
b) Alcohol
c) Coca Cola
d) Fried food
e) Tobacco
51.
Is there any evidence for the existence of angels?
a) Yes
b) No
52.
Is there any evidence for alien visitations and/or abductions?
a) Yes
b) No
53.
Is there any evidence that vaccinations cause developmental disabilities?
a) Yes
b) No
54.
Is there any evidence of psychic abilities?
a) Yes
b) No
55.
What happens when you drastically increase the amount of carbon dioxide in an atmosphere?
a) Nothing.
b) The Lord is pleased.
c) The atmosphere traps more heat, leading to runaway climate change.
d) Carbon dioxide is a liberal hoax. There are only three kinds of aether - luminiferous, soporiferous, stratorious, and omenificious (the devil's aether).
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Enjoy this image of asteroid Vesta from the Dawn space probe as an intermission before looking at the answers below.
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1. (e) Light is both a wave and a particle, depending on how it is measured. "Wave" and "particle" are just human concepts, and need not constrain reality that moves in far more interesting ways. "Extensor" and "Proteron" are random scientific-sounding words thrown in for confusion.
2. (d) Light is an example of electromagnetic radiation. It is the small part of the electromagnetic spectrum that humans can see, in mid-range wavelengths longer than ultraviolet and shorter than infrared.
3. (b) Inertia is not a force, but a property of the conservation of energy.
4. (g) Electricity and magnetism are carried by the same particle, the photon, and change in one causes the other.
5. (a) Gravity is determined by mass and distance.
6. (e) The universe is currently thought to be 13.7 billion years old, based on the distance in light years to the furthest visible cosmic structures.
7. (d) Earth is dated to about 4.5 billion years.
8. (c) Ceres, Pluto, and Eris are dwarf planets - solid objects not in orbit around a planet, that are large enough for gravity to smooth their shape into spheroids, but do not dominate the mass of their orbital region.
9. (b) B stars are hotter than A stars. From hottest to coolest, the spectral classification goes O, B, A, F, G, K, M, which covers the bulk of observed stars. Further classifications exist for even cooler stars than M that glow dully rather than shine.
10. (c) Trojan asteroids occupy the triangular Lagrange points of a planet in two swarms, one 60 degrees ahead of the planet in its solar orbit and one 60 degrees behind it. This occurs because these locations are gravitationally stable, so objects tend to congregate in them.
11. (b) Alpha Centauri is a triple-star system, not a star itself. The three stars are Alpha Centauri A, Alpha Centauri B, and Proxima, the closest star to our solar system.
12. (a) Our galaxy is called the Milky Way because of its cloudy appearance as a strip across the Earth's sky.
13. (d) Our location in the Milky Way is the Orion Spur - a thin connector between the Perseus and Sagittarius Arms.
14. (a) Pico comes after nano in the standard system of metric prefixes, and denotes 1 trillionth.
15. (e) Protons and neutrons are each composed of three, smaller subatomic particles called quarks.
16. (d) Neutrons are slightly more massive than protons. The way to remember this is that a neutron can be created by forcing an electron to merge with a proton, canceling their respective charges and adding the electron's miniscule mass to that of the proton. This is how neutron stars come about, where gravity is so intense that electrons are forced into the nucleus.
17. (c) A theory is not a guess - not even an educated guess. It is a working model that explains what happened in the past and makes testable predictions for the future. If its predictions fail, then the theory, or at least part of it, is invalid. If it accurately predicts something but fails to predict something else, the theory may be invalid or may just be incomplete.
18. (a) Obviously, the validity of a theory has nothing to do with the amount of faith put into it, and also has nothing to do with interference from magical beings.
19. (c) Newton's Laws of Motion are a theory, not an axiom. An axiom is an assumption that cannot be tested, but must simply be presumed. The fundamental axioms of science are as follows: Occam's Razor - i.e., that an equally valid explanation with fewer untested or untestable assumptions is preferable to one with more. So, for instance, I could explain a flying baseball by hypothesizing it was hit by a baseball bat, as is often observed, or I could explain it by hypothesizing that it was launched by a medieval catapult, which would require a much more evidence to sustain - thus Occam's Razor favors the bat as the origin of the flying ball. Science also assumes Empiricism, meaning that conclusions can be verified observationally - conceptions of a thing that is invisible, immaterial, and non-interactive with the physical world are scientifically devoid. Logic is also axiomatic - i.e., if you can prove an idea internally inconsistent, or inconsistent with available evidence, then it is false - you cannot simply discount logic and say "But what if" mutually exclusive things were true. Similarly, science assumes Causation - i.e., everything has causes, and everything has effects, in an unending and unbounded chain. There is no mystical Fiat as supposed in myth and religion that can simply interrupt chains of events.
20. (c) Nitrogen is the main component of Earth's atmosphere. We are breathing it as we speak. We con do so because nitrogen is an inert gas, and does not chemically react under normal conditions, so though it enters our lungs and adds to air pressure, it does not react chemically with our blood - it just sits there until exhaled. We could breathe just as well if the nitrogen in our atmosphere were replaced with argon. We wouldn't notice any difference, although there might be complex consequences for the wider biosphere.
21. (d) Cladistics is the more modern branch of taxonomy that classifies organisms according to evolutionary descent rather than the more haphazard, early classifications based on how things look or behave. Species are organized into branching clades that illustrate their descent.
22. (a) Nuclear fusion in the Sun's core is the ultimate source of life's energy on Earth. The animals humans eat got their energy from eating plants, which in turn got it from the Sun, which turn originated in the solar core due to nuclear fusion. So really the Sun is the base of terrestrial family tree, and source of all our nourishment.
23. (c) Supercritical. This is an exotic state of matter not seen on Earth, but prevalent in the lower atmospheres of Venus and gas giant planets. It moves fluidly, but has properties of both gas and liquid - for instance, it expands to fill a container, but can also dissolve minerals like a liquid.
24. (b)Atoms interact mostly by trading, stealing and sharing electrons, or bumping into other atoms' electrons. Not much else happens in chemistry.
25. (c) A light beam hitting the black hole at perfect tangent would never cross the event horizon, but could not escape either. Its path would be bent into a circle it would not escape, and would then spin around the event horizon forever. At least until some chunk of mass entered the black hole and caused the event horizon to expand, at which point the beam would no longer be no the event horizon. At that point it would be inside, and its path would curve inward toward the singularity.
26. (b)Therapsids Most people mistakenly think of the Triassic in terms of dinosaurs, but dinosaurs were only a minority part of the animal life. The dominant life forms were therapsids - our own proto-mammal ancestors ruled the Earth for millions of years before climate change began favoring dinosaurs and turned them into giants while making therapsids into small, scurrying little critters. The demise of the dinosaurs later was just a restoration of a line that previously reigned.
27. (c) Astronauts are weightless because they are in free-fall. Yes, they are literally falling the entire time they are in space. There is plenty of gravity around, but it doesn't matter to them because they're falling through it. But they don't come down because they fall in a circle called an orbit. If they couldn't orbit - if you brought them to a dead stop in space - they would fall straight down to the surface instead of falling in a circle. If you were to build a tower tall enouhg to reach their location, people walk on top of it - the gravity at that location would only be a tiny fraction less than on Earth's surface. So it's the orbital motion, not the height that allows astronauts to be weightless. They would have to go much, much farther away to experience true microgravity, where the field itself is weak.
28. (e) The Ozone layer contains chemicals, notably ozone, that absorb and block UV radiation far more powerfully than other atmospheric constituents.
29. (b) The Magnetosphere is the Earth's electromagnetic field, which captures and deflects charged particles from the Sun and the rest of the cosmos that would otherwise be very damaging. It channels them to the poles, where they occasionally cause aurora shows and, in intense situations, communications blackouts.
30. (b) Longer wavelengths of electromagnetic radiation are less energetic than longer wavelengths.
31. (d)Human experience, emotions, thoughts, pain, pleasure, love, hate, etc. are all finite electro-chemical reactions on the molecular level in the brain. I make a point of distinguishing this answer fein another that claim human experiences are caused by brain process - they are not caused by brain processes, they are brain processes. The impulses firing in your brain when you feel love, ARE love, they are not mere heralds of love or manifestations of some deeper, more mystical phenomenon, but the thing itself. That distinct pattern of electrochemical firing is lovel Build a robot suffuciently advanced to simulate that pattern, fire it off, and the robot will feel love, truly and genuinely, no more a simulation than when it occurred in your brain.
32. (d) After death, humans become an all-you-can-eat buffet for hungry microorganisms. Heroic ages of prosperity, famine, war, and peace may occur among these countless organisms over the months while your body continues to decay. It is a long process of redistributing the materials that went into composing you, now going into countless other purposes. Sorry, no heavenly Disneyland for God's children. But take solace: It's no more and no less horrific than anything else that has ever existed.
33. (c) On the other side of the coin, prior to gestation you do not exist because the materials that comprise you have not yet been brought together. You are not a disembodied entity waiting for a vehicle - you do not exist. This is the same reason you cease to exist at death. The complexities of human existence derive from the dynamic interactions of physical systems, but as per the Empiricism and Causality axioms of science, as well as Occam's Razor, there is no "non-physical" process at work, and ineed such a concept cannot even be self-consistently articulated. Dust to dust.
34. (d)Time is the ratio of change in one thing compared to the change in something else. For instance, the only reason we find the apparent movement of the Sun in Earth's sky meaningful is because it correlates to other changes we observe, such as the darkening of the environment and cooling of the weather when it sets. Time can be established using any such correlations, and indeed standard time units like the second are based on observed physical occurrences on the subatomic level - e.g., it an electron thus-and-such an amount of time to run through x cycles, and that our standard time interval.
35. (d) DNA and RNA are built of smaller nucleic acid chains called nucleotides.
36. (b) Isotopes are atoms of the same element with different numbers of neutrons in the nucleus. They have somewhat different properties - e.g., one isotope can be radioactive while another may be harmless. But they can substitute for one another in chemical reactions.
37. (e) Mitochondria are semi-autonomous organelles within animal cells that are thought to have originally been independent bacteria. At some point they came into the cell and evolved a mutually beneficial relationship, acting as the cell's power plant by helping churn out energy-rich chemicals like ATP. They are an example of symbiosis.
38. (b) The Sun will become a white dwarf when it dies. This is a bright, small stellar remnant that shines only because of the heat still trapped inside it, but it is no longer generating energy of its own. The Sun doesn't have enough mass to become anything more exotic, like neutron stars or black holes.
39. (a) Water molecules are polar, meaning one side of the mole has a slight partial charge while the other side has a slight partial opposite charge. This is enough break apart some ionic compounds like salt, with the negative parts attracted to the negatively-polar part of the water molecule and the positive parts to the other side. This effectively dissolves them. It is also part of why water is sticky - it modestly adheres to itself and to anything else with polar or full-on electrical charges.
40. (g) The universe is expanding at an accelerating rate.
41. (d) Phobos is a moon of a terrestrial planet, Mars. The rest are moons of gas giants.
42. (e) 763 is the current tally of confirmed planets, although that may or may not include the 8 from this solar system. New planets are being discovered and confirmed frequently, sometimes on a daily basis. There are, however, a backlog of well over a thousand planet candidates who have yet to be confirmed.
43. (a) True: Recent findings proved conclusively that most human beings alive today, apart from sub-Saharan Africa, contain some portion of DNA inherited from Neanderthal ancestors.
44. (c) A giant impact blew off a huge part of the Earth's mantle into orbit, and it subsequently cooled into the Moon. It was originally much closer, but over time has spiraled outward to its current location. It is still receding.
45. (f) Both the Moon and the Sun cause ocean tides by their gravity pulling on the oceans. Since oceans are liquid, they are free to move and distort according to the forces acting on them, and faces closest to either the Moon or Sun will be drawn toward them (high tides) with high tides also occurring at the opposite ends of the world from those points. Low tides occur 90 degrees off high tide areas.
46. (d) Earth's equatorial bulging occurs due to the centrifugal force from its rotation. Although Mt. Everest is the mountain highest above sea level, a mountain in South America is furthest from the Earth's core because it benefits from being near the equatorial bulge.
47. (d) It isn't. I just made that up.
48. (k) b and d - the word refers to two separate, unrelated things: An energized state of matter with nuclei stripped of electrons, and a fluid suspension used in blood.
49. (b) Infrared. The rule of thumb is that non-glowing things that feel hot to the touch are emitting infrared (IR) radiation. Except for radioactive metals like uranium and plutonium, in which case they feel hot because they're emitting energetic particles that are tearing your DNA to shreds, so in that case run like hell. Otherwise, it's just good old infrared.
50. (a) Marijuana is not known to cause significant health problems in adults, unlike alcohol, tobacco, fattening foods, salty foods, and foods and beverages containing high fructose corn syrup. Oddly, marijuana is brutally suppressed, while most of the other substances mentioned are subsidized and proliferated with institutional support.
51. (b) No. No claims have ever held up to scrutiny.
52. (b) No. No claims have ever held up to scrutiny.
53. (b) No. No claims have ever held up to scrutiny.
54. (b) No. No claims have ever held up to scrutiny.
55. (c) More carbon dioxide in the atmosphere means a hotter atmosphere, faster hurricanes, more chaotic weather, sea level changes, disruptions to rainfall patterns, and other potentially devastating consequences.