Take the on-line test
Poll results As a part of my investigation, I’ve conducted a survey to find out real level of knowledge on this field. 172 people aged from 7 to 72 were interviewed and each was asked 2 general and 8 specific questions, as listed:
1) Did you ever take any interest in space?
2) What is a “shooting star”?
-a star
-a body burned down in the atmosphere
-UFO
-electricity in the atmosphere
3)What were the reasons for the death of dinosaurs?
-hunger
-ice age
-high velocity impact
-epidemic
4)Tunguska is…
-high velocity impact
-a river in Siberia
-a Siberian woman
-unsuccessful UFO landing
5)What is a meteorite?
-parts of a space ship
-ice from the clouds
-rocks from volcanoes on the Earth
-parts of an asteroid
6)What size should the meteorite be to make a crater of 1200 meters?
-5 m
-50 m
-300 m
-1200 m
7) The speed of a meteorite before entering the atmosphere is like the speed of a…
-human being
-car
-airplane
-space ship
8)Why there is much more craters on the Moon then on the Earth?
-because there are more meteorites
-because there are no plants
-because there is no atmosphere
-because there are no humans
9)How can you explain the fact that there are a lot of rare minerals in the craters?
-metamorphosis of the Earth minerals
-a meteorite contains them
-just a coincidence
-this is magma from the Earth’s depths
10) Have you ever watched any movies about space catastrophes? Name some.
The results were quiet suprising. Although only 7% admitted not taking any interest in space, the results for 8 specific questions were devastating. Only 2% were able to answer all the questions. 4% were not able to answer at all. Comparitevely good result (5-7 right answers) was shown by 10%. The average result is 4 answers.
Another interesting fact is that over twelve space catastrophes movies were listed, “Armaggeddon”, “Deep Impact”, “Meteor”, “Asteroid” being the most popular. That partly explains the result of the knowledge test, as it turns out that most of the information is got form science-fiction, not serious reliable sources.