Where Food Comes From

As I've discussed previously, we often see surveys that bemoan the public's lack of knowledge -- coincidentally, on whatever topic interests the sponsors of the survey.  Doctors bemoan the lack of health knowledge, nutritionists bemoan the lack of knowledge about healthy eating, and so on.

Here's a new one.  Ya gotta love it.  The hed:

Survey Reveals
"Shocking" Lack
of Food Knowledge

Shocking?  Uh oh.  Is mass starvation just around the corner as people forget how to eat?

No, it turns out people (Brits, in this case) apparently are a bit baffled over the sources of their food, or so suggests a survey reported in this story.  It continues:

Of 2,000 16- to 23-year-olds surveyed by One Poll in May, 36% failed to link bacon with pigs, while 12% thought that steak came from wheat or maize, and 7% thought that milk came from wheat or maize. Four in 10 young adults failed to link milk with dairy cows.

The survey sponsor?  Something called Linking Environment And Farming (LEAF).

It's perfectly understandable that 2-out-of-5 Brits don't see milk as related to cows.  Milk comes from cartons and bottles, of course.  And stores.

It's heartening to know Americans aren't the only ones sometimes without a clue.

This has been reported extensively elsewhere (see here, for example), but lemme point out the Pew findings on who is aware, and unaware, of the recent gigantic health decision by the U.S. Supreme Court. 

Who's clueless?  Survey says: young people. 

See the table below.  Among the youngest adults, 43 percent didn't know what the court decided.  As is the case with most forms of political knowledge, the accuracy somewhat increases with age and certainly the likelihood of saying "don't know" goes down.

Let's acknowledge that younger people are (1) less politically interested and (2) less interested specifically in health care given where they are in their life cycle and (3) are, yes, less politically interested.

Or, perhaps, they're less likely to guess?  There is research that suggests men are more willing to guess at a political knowledge question than women.  No evidence here of that.  Just making note of it.

A Partisan Divide? Oh, Yeah

If ever there was any doubt of a partisan divide in the U.S., Thursday's Supreme Court decision on health care answers all doubts.  According to a new Gallup Poll:
              
                Dems    GOP   Ind    All
Agree          79       83      45    46
Disagree      16       13      42    46

Talk about your partisan split, with Independents edging in favor of Obamacare.

Civility in News

Fox News is the most uncivil source of news, PBS the most civil, at least according to a survey released today (read a brief report here, download the actual PDF here, which is part of a larger "civility in America" study).

First off, let's be clear -- this is not an analysis of actual content.  Rather, this is a survey of people and their perceptions of civility.  Actual content studies do exist, one of my favorites being how often in a minute Bill O'Reilly manages to insult someone (answer, every seven seconds, see my post about that study).

What's making things less civil?  Survey says:

1. Politicians
2. Government officials
3. The economy
4. America's Youth
5. Media
6. Celebrities
7. Corporate America
8. Internet/Social Media
9. Sports Figures
10. Cellphones
11. Twitter
12. None of the above

We can feast on the above list for days, but let's move on to the fun stuff:

• Republicans in Congress are seen as more uncivil than Democrats
• The Occupy movement is more uncivil than the Tea Party
•  Schools are a cause of incivility more than pro sports
• Urbanites are the least civil
• Pepsi is more uncivil than Coke (I made this one up)

I'd go on (and on and on), but summer hours are a precious beer-drinking time, so check out the report yourself.

Column on the Public's Knowledge

It's summer.  And I'm lazy.  So today I merely point to this interesting column about the public's knowledge and whether it makes sense to always be attentive to politics.

The Brainiest Cities in the U.S.

We love lists.  They're catchy, they give us something to argue over, and they make for fun stories.  Here's one I just came across thanks to the magic of Twitter: America's Brainiest Cities.

Oh dear, you're thinking, this is gonna be bad.

To save time, here's the list of America's 25 brainiest, according to the metrics a company created (read the story for a discussion):

1. Charlottesville, Virginia
2. Lafayette, Indiana
3. Anchorage Alaska
4. Madison, Wisconsin
5. San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose 
6. Cedar Rapids-Waterloo-Iowa City & Dubuque, Iowa
7. Honolulu
8. Johnstown-Altoona, Pennsylvania
9. Champaign & Springfield-Decatur, Illinois
10. Minneapolis-St. Paul
11. Boston-Manchester (Massachusetts/New Hampshire)
12. Austin
13. Rochester, New York
14. Gainesville, Florida 
15. Fargo-Valley City North Dakota
16. Lansing, Michigan 
17. Santa Barbara-Santa Maria-San Luis Obispo
18. Burlington-Plattsburgh (Vermont/New York) 
19. Pittsburgh
20. Syracuse, New York
21. Baton Rouge, Louisiana
22. Columbia-Jefferson City, Missouri
23. La Crosse-Eau Claire, Wisconsin
24. Harrisburg-Lancaster-Lebanon-York Pennsylvania
25. Springfield-Holyoke, Massachusetts

Many make sense. College towns, noted cities.  But Baton Rouge?  Sorry, I've spent a lot of time in Baton Rouge, La., and brainy is not one of the first words that comes to mind, otherwise I can't really quibble without delving deeply into their methodology, which I'm not going to do because it's the first day of summer class and probably I need to actually prepare for the semester in the next hour or so.

No Change = News?

Nearly half of Americans believe God created humans in their present form in the last 10,000 years.

Yes, I know ... scientifically implausible given the massive fossil record.  As a practicing Catholic, I have no problem believing God played a role in creation but that man (and all the other critters) evolved over a huge amount of time, but 46 percent of Americans think we magically appeared in the last 10,000 years.  Probably along with the dinosaurs.

My headline above, though, says No Change = News? because, frankly, even the news story tells us the public really hasn't changed all that much:

That number has remained unchanged for the past 30 years, since 1982, when Gallup first asked the question on creationism versus evolution. Thirty years ago, 44% of the people who responded said they believed that God created humans as we know them today - only a 2-point difference from 2012.

So is it news that people remain unchanged in this belief?  Yes, if for no other reason than to demonstrate we're not getting any smarter, at least when it comes to what people know about science.

Sigh.