Pointless polls
pharyngula | October 26, 2008The Edmonton Sun asks, "Should God be left out of the University of Alberta's convocation speech?" I should think so. They should also leave Odin, Zeus, and the Tooth Fairy out of it, unless it's to make a joke. Surprisingly, though, 67% of the respondents disagree with me so far. Will that have changed when I wake up in the morning, I wonder…?
pharyngula | October 14, 2008How can I resist this poll? It's on a site called Pray for McCain-Palin, which is hilarious in itself, and here's the poll on that page:
Senator McCain's Pick of Sarah Palin as Vice Presidential Running Mate
Solidified my vote for him: 66%
Didn't change my vote for him: 5%
Made me less likely to vote for him: 4%
Didn't change my vote against him: 1%
Solidified my vote against him: 25%
Prayer won't help you now, Jebusites. The Pharynguloid hordes are coming.
pharyngula | October 10, 2008Oh, come now. Are they just taunting me, waving a bit of succulent red meat before and begging me to bite? Should topics such as creationism or intelligent design be taught in public schools alongside the theory of evolution? 85% say yes. I cannot believe that 85% of the population are that stupid, although it is being hosted on the American Patriarchy News Network, which would tend to bias the sample downward.
Gah. This came out garbled before, and you would not believe how long it took to get in and fix it. The scienceblogs server is rapidly becoming intolerable…which, of course, is exactly…
pharyngula | October 9, 2008Oh, come on. A poll at a forum for the Minerals, Metals and Materials society that asks, "Which U.S. Presidential Candidate Would Better Advance Science and Engineering if Elected?", and John McCain is winning 59% to 39%? That poll needs some adjusting.
pharyngula | October 6, 2008Since you all whomped that last poll with a ruthless savagery that does a godless brute proud, how about a new one? Should abstinence-only sex ed continue?. So far, "Yes" is winning 53% to 47%, despite the fact that abstinence-only sex ed does not work, and has been demonstrated to be an abject failure time and time again.
It's sad to see such a close vote in a poll that really should be a slam dunk. How about making one of those bars swell like Bristol Palin's fecund little belly?
pharyngula | October 5, 2008Isn't technology wonderful? It allows the woo-woos to spread their nonsense so much more rapidly, and to look slick and shiny and modern while they do it. Take a look at this report and polls on a site called AOL Health — AOL Quackery is more like it — which describes a survey that says 16% of Americans claim to have experienced a "miraculous healing", as if that somehow increases the credibility of the experience. It does not. All it means is that the gullible have been primed with an explanation that they will regurgitate when queried.
Do they think this through? No. They even cite that "…
pharyngula | October 3, 2008Rather than asking random internet voters to decide who should be Leader of the Free World, how about this one: Should Montel have psychic Sylvia Browne on his new show?
For those who don't know who this is about, Montel Williams is an ex-talk show host best known for having gullible tripe on every week — in particular, the odious, awful Jabba the Hut Sylvia Browne. Williams is apparently getting a new show (don't ask me why, as far as I'm concerned he's a cut-rate version of Oprah, who's rather awful, too), and a few people are wondering if it'll be as credulous and phony as his old one.…
pharyngula | October 1, 2008An internet poll, which we all know is always accurate, representative, and binding, was held this week to determine who would be president of the US. Voters selected between Obama, McCain, Hillary Clinton, and a fourth, unlikely, dark horse candidate…me.
I won.
I think I've heard this song before, by Spike Jones and his City Slickers, only my name was Feitlebaum then.
pharyngula | October 1, 2008The ScienceBlogs Book Club has started up again, and this time around the book under discussion is Paul Offit's Autism's False Prophets: Bad Science, Risky Medicine, and the Search for a Cure(amzn/b&n/abe/pwll). Offit has an entry over there right now, and more will be piling on soon.
This is a good subject to tackle, too: the anti-vaccination clowns are yet another outbreak of lunacy and innumeracy and anti-science nuttery, and Offit's book fights the good fight. Expect howls of outrage from the clowns.
(By the way, one of the circuses full of clowns is trying to oppose our poll-crushing…
pharyngula | September 30, 2008That is, Jenny McCarthy, ditzy mummy who opposes vaccinations because she thinks they cause autism, and Amanda Peet, smart woman who knows that inoculation is a great benefit. McCarthy has just sniped at Peet:
"(Peet) has a lot of [nerve] to come forward and be on that side, because there is an angry mob on my side, and I like the fact that I can say she's completely wrong. I look at (Peet) now and say to myself, 'That was me before I had autism in my life,' and until she walks in our shoes, she really has no idea."
Oh ho — so Jenny McCarthy's great logical defense of her position is that…
pharyngula | September 29, 2008Let us stir up a little tempest in Tennessee. An internet poll asks, SHOULD A DISPLAY OF THE 10 COMMANDMENTS BE ALLOWED IN OUR COUNTY COURTHOUSE?. The currently leading answer, with 82% of the vote, is "Absolutely. The laws of our land are based on the 10 Commandments and anybody who doesn't want to look at them (or read them) certainly doesn't have to do so."
This poll also has something sneaky. There are 5 possible answers, but they've just worded the same thing differently to split our votes. The intelligent options are "Such a display is inappropriate in any public building," "No way.…
pharyngula | September 24, 2008We can still squash it. An article about the Texas science standards has this question on the side: What do you think the appropriate lesson should be in public schools?
Evolution only (50%)
Evolution, pointing out weaknesses in theory (5%)
Evolution and creationism (32%)
Creationism only (13%)
Pick one!
pharyngula | September 22, 2008For the last week, I've been getting multiple, daily requests to crash this poll: Do you think Sarah Palin is qualified to serve as Vice President of the United States? We already did it. Other groups have also been crashing it, and it's also been hacked, last I heard it had votes in the millions, votes cast by scripts, not people. The poll is passed on. It is no more. It has ceased to be. It's expired and gone to meet its maker. It's a stiff. Bereft of life, it rests in peace. It is an EX-POLL. It has been so thoroughly crashed that our purpose is done, its credibility is undermined,…
pharyngula | September 21, 2008This is what happens when you can't comprehend the ordinary physical properties of fluids: you start hailing grungy old bottles of gloppy stuff as your salvation. Naples has gotten all excited about a bottle of "liquifying saint's blood" — it's incredibly silly. And just as silly, there is an online poll: Do you believe in miracles?. So far, 64% of the respondents say they do.
They should have asked, "do you believe in gullible people?", because then I would have voted yes.
pharyngula | September 16, 2008There isn't a "HELL, NO" option on this one, but there ought to be. Do you think Sarah Palin is qualified to serve as Vice President of the United States?
"Yes" is currently leading 55:43.
pharyngula | September 15, 2008So, the Church of England is considering a public apology for their denial of evolution — it's progress, I suppose, although CoE has never had the reputation of being particularly vicious towards evolution, and I'd be more impressed if the Baptists were asking forgiveness. Anyway, here's a poll: Should the Church apologise to Charles Darwin?
Unfortunately, the only choices are "yes" and "no". I was hoping for something like "Yes, the church ought to get on its knees and crawl in abasement to Science, kiss the hem of its robes, beg forgiveness, and donate all of its holdings and wealth to…
pharyngula | September 10, 2008Scroll down on the linked page to find a very silly poll: Do you believe in the Big Bang?. It's a pretty stupid question, but even worse is the fact that "no" is winning 82%:18%.
pharyngula | September 9, 2008I guess I don't quite see the difference from a pointless poll, but let's bite. A right-wing blogger is asking for bipartisan participation in a "survey" about the expected winner in the presidential election. Results will not be available until after the election, but go ahead and give it a shot.
pharyngula | September 6, 2008It's true, I cannot overcome this poll on WorldNutDaily. They are 'reporting' on the Large Hadron Collider and the weird fact that people are fretting over whether the Swiss will annihilate the word, so they ask their readers about why they're worried.
The first way they stumped me was by not giving any good answers (the seventh and eighth are probably closest to what I think). Then they threw in so many possible answers, which contain a lot of insane answers, which I thought at first were intended to be jokes…until I looked and saw that several of the crazy answers were leading in votes.
So…