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Jeremy · Post by **Jeremy** » 06 Jul 2005 08:27

Please don't research the answer to this or post anything that suggests the answer. Please answer as honestly as you can. Remember it's anonymous so nobody is going to know if you get it wrong or not. This is based on a stat i heard a long time ago but was reminded of reading my own posts

max · Post by **max** » 06 Jul 2005 08:29

care to PM me what that stat was?

bigdirtyfoot · Post by **bigdirtyfoot** » 06 Jul 2005 08:32

I know the answer. Ooh, ooh!

brian relly · Post by **brian relly** » 06 Jul 2005 08:35

I get the feeling it's a trick question...

bigdirtyfoot · Post by **bigdirtyfoot** » 06 Jul 2005 08:37

Yeah I think I know the answer and I think it is definitely a trick question and that will be funny.

Tsiangkun · Post by **Tsiangkun** » 06 Jul 2005 10:05

Aren't you missing an option ?

I seem to remember something about a setting sun in WWII.

delakong · Post by **delakong** » 06 Jul 2005 10:54

Me too.

ted · Post by **ted** » 06 Jul 2005 12:02

not me.

FlexThis · Post by **FlexThis** » 06 Jul 2005 12:08

Iain · Post by **Iain** » 06 Jul 2005 12:32

ah ha! i've ruined the poll

shreddaily · Post by **shreddaily** » 06 Jul 2005 13:21

I heard a stat that says 68% of the people who live outside North America eat turds for breakfast and crap out grape fruit. Sats suck my butt.

slapdash21 · Post by **slapdash21** » 06 Jul 2005 13:30

shreddaily wrote:I heard a stat that says 68% of the people who live outside North America eat turds for breakfast and crap out grape fruit. Sats suck my butt.

i heard that too. also i recollect somestatistics that claim 2 out of 2 north americans have heard a statistic involving australian turd-munching

Outsider · Post by **Outsider** » 06 Jul 2005 14:12

A trick question? Maybe I'm just naive, but I didn't suspect a trick until everybody else chimed in.

None-the-less, what I WAS thinking was that the statistic in question would say something like some embarrassingly large majority of Americans would select the wrong country when asked who we fought in WWII. I suspect, though, that the strangely skewwed numbers were a product of the times: as you said, it was an old statistic (I'm betting something from the early 1980's), and at that time the primary foe of the U.S. was the primary foe that we spoke about in school, on television, and in the movies. Ask a bunch of junior high kids back in 1985 who we fought in WWII and most of them would probably give a knee-jerk response since they haven't had alot of world history lessons yet, WWII was way before their time, and the other option, the wrong option, was the enemy on all their minds courtesy of Rambo, Rocky IV, Ronald Reagan, and so many other bits of flashy pop-culture. I'd say its kind of a bullshit statistic, skewwed way out because of who the questioners were asking.

Anyway, I think it was Benjamin Disraeli who said "There are three kinds of lies: Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics." Its an easy thing to get meaningless or misleading statistics. There are many ways of asking the wrong questions or asking the wrong people, or otherwise fouling your results when gathering your data. Just because you've expressed some information in easy to understand numbers does not make it true.

Jeremy, since you seem so fond of statistics (you quote them all the time, man) (its okay, I like them too) I encourage you to take a university level statistics class. Most people hate that class. Many avoid it. Many fail it (I dropped out of my "statistics for science majors" class and managed to get around the requirement by talking my way into a "statistics for Sociology" class instead because it was less difficult and more interesting, more about statistics and people rather than statistics and physical and chemical effects), but it can be enlightening, and will help one to interpret and understand all the various statistics that come one's way on a day-to-day basis.

Just remember: "90% percent of all statistics are false." (see, thats a little joke, because it is itself a statistic, and it calls into question the validity of all statistics, thus it questions its own credibility. Funny, n'est pas?)

FlexThis · Post by **FlexThis** » 06 Jul 2005 15:18

C-Fan · Post by **C-Fan** » 06 Jul 2005 21:05

OK, this needs to stop right now. No more bad-mouthing Rocky IV

skoxn · Post by **skoxn** » 06 Jul 2005 23:18

Outsider wrote:Ask a bunch of junior high kids back in 1985 who we fought in WWII and most of them would probably give a knee-jerk response since they haven't had alot of world history lessons yet.

well, a few years ago, a group of schoolfriends were on an exchange in america. they slept in buffalo, the partner city of our city.
the young-aged school kids asked them, if we know and use toothbrushes and toothpaste in germany?!?! if anyone else doesn´t know, WE HAVE SOME OVER HERE, yes!!

so, i wouldn´t wonder, if this poll would show a strange result!

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The United States of America fought World War 2 against which of these nations?

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