On May 6, 9:36=A0am, "John Dean" <john-d...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> Scour Old Cereal Bowls wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > Supposedly, 23 percent of (take your pick) all British people or
> > British people under 20 believe that Winston Churchill was just a
> > myth.
>
>
>http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1577511/Winston-Churchill-didn't-
> > really-exist,-say-teens.html
>
> >http://uktv.co.uk/gold/stepbystep/aid/598605
>
> > UKTV sponsored the study, and the only bit on their website doesn't
> > say anything about kids being asked, but it does say it's based on
> > 3,000 responses.
>
> > Doesn't that number suggest it's not a scientific survey? =A0The
survey
> > goes on to say that 58% believe Sherlock Holmes was real -- this is
> > getting even more bogus sounding. =A0It goes on to list "Top ten
> > fictional characters that the British public thinks are real" with #5
> > being Mona Lisa -- except she wasn't fictional....
>
> Their list of 'fictional' characters is more than a little weird:
>
> 1) King Arthur - 65% - ficitional in the Richard Harris Camelot sense,
but=
> arguably a historical character in his Artos incarnation
> 3) Robin Hood - 51% - Many ficitional treatments but, again, there are
> historians who offer reasonable evidence that he's based on a real
person.=
> 5) Mona Lisa -35% - As you say, undeniably real
> 6) Dick Turpin - 34% - Incontestably a real person, though a real ****
as
> opposed to the, er, Robin Hood persona of the fictional Turpins
> 8) The Three Musketeers - 17% - real people, though Dumas' work was
largel=
y
> invention
> 9) Lady Godiva - 12% - Definitely real, though the ****d ride was almost
> certainly fiction
> 10) Robinson Crusoe - 5% =A0- The ficitional version of Alexander
Selkirk
I've taken standardized tests like that: I can guess what the test
maker thinks is the right answer, but know that it is wrong, or at
least that the question is so badly written as to be meaningless. My
response to such tests depends entirely on what is in it for me.
But... Mona Lisa? That's just bizarre. It makes me wonder if they
aren't going meta on us, with the survey itself being an ironic
commentary on ignorance. But I suspect I am giving them far too much
credit.
Richard R. Hershberger
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