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Frank,
The "fictional character" was Sherlock Holmes.
Once I was walking in Warsaw with few mathematicians from various countries.
(These were not students or simple PhD's but all serious research
mathematicians, professors).
As the only eastern European among them, I served as a guide.
When we saw Copernicus monument, and I started to explain the history
of the MONUMENT, one professor from China asked "who he is ?"....

Actually the results of the poll you mention are not that shocking
on my point of view. Is it really an important difference, what rotates
about what? If you use the Nautical almanac every day, can you conclude
from it that Earth rotates around Sun, not the other way around?

Alex.





> There have been a couple of messages talking about a recent survey
> suggesting that 25% of Americans do not know that the Earth revolves
> around the Sun. Shocking! Or maybe not. Undoubtedly, a lot of this has to
> do with testing dynamics. Some people just get anxious when they're asked
> anything remotely academic. Some think it's fun to game the results (in
> other words, they intentionally answer wrong). Some are dyslexic. And yes,
> for many, it's just one of those things that they are aware of, and could
> probably get right if asked with a little gentle coaching, but they might
> well answer wrong on the first pass. There's a whole lot going on here
> beyond a simple measure of intelligence or knowledge.
>
> The link that Gary posted earlier from the Telegraph, a UK newspaper,
> reminded me of a famous fictional British character who freely admitted
> that he did not know that the Earth revolves around the Sun. Indeed, it
> came up again in a very enjoyable recent BBC adaptation of the character
> starring Benedict Cumberbatch. This literary character was not exactly
> created as a dullard or even an 'idiot savant'. Can you name him?? His
> excuse was that the information is utterly useless to him. And he's right.
> Grade school astronomy has almost no practical value whatsoever, except
> (perhaps!) to celestial navigators and a few other narrow sects. This
> particular litmus test does not measure scientific knowledge or reason as
> much as scientific "literacy" or exposure. It's something that everyone
> has certainly learned at some point in their lives. But such information
> fades to childhood trivia if nothing reinforces it over a person's
> lifetime. For many people the names of the eight (or nine) planets have no
> more value than the names of the eight (or nine) reindeer pulling Santa's
> sleigh. Both are cultural trivia from childhood...
>
> Finally, a little physics: we all understand that motion is relative,
> right? If I run past you at 10 mph, then it's the same as if you run past
> me at 10 mph (in a specific, profound sense) despite the fact that common
> sense readily tells us who's running and who's not. We learn to set aside
> common sense and accept this principle of relativity of motion. Ok,
> then... what about the Earth's motion at 30 km/sec around the Sun? Can't
> we say that it's just the same as the Sun revolving around the Earth since
> all motion is relative?? The answer is 'no' because the premise is wrong.
> It's not true that ALL motion is relative. Nonetheless, it certainly
> complicates matters!
>
> -FER
>
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