Knowing, not knowing, and "confident boobery"

.....A week ago (What Do Americans Know?), Newsweek reported the results of a poll that it conducted that was designed to gauge what “U.S. citizens know on a broad range of topics.”
.....Since we've been focused on American boobery lately, I figured we might take a look at this poll. First, here are some of the poll’s questions and results (correct answers are in bold):

• Do you happen to know the name of the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court?


15 Yes, John Roberts
7 Yes, other name given

77 No/Don't know/Can't name anyone

1 Refused

• As far as you know, what is Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's religion? Is he a Christian, a Muslim, or something else?


61 Christian

13 Muslim

7 Something else

19 Not sure/Refused

• Do you think Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq was DIRECTLY involved in planning, financing, or carrying out the terrorist attacks of September 11th, 2001, or not?


Yes 34

No 56

Don't Know 10

• Which of the following is the TOTAL national debt at this time?


15 About 3 trillion dollars

15 About 5 trillion dollars

22 About 7 trillion dollars

32 More than 9 trillion dollars

16 Don't know

• Which of the following is the holiest place in Islam?


30 Jerusalem

56 Mecca

1 Medina

3 Islamabad

10 Don't know

• Which of the following is NOT a play written by William Shakespeare?


4 Hamlet

4 Macbeth

20 The Merchant of Venice

58 The Crucible

14 Don't know

TRIVIA, SENSE OF PROPORTION:

.....It seems to me that some of Newsweek’s “knowledge” questions were really “trivia” questions: "Which of the following is the most-watched episode ever of a primetime TV series?"

.....Further, this Newsweek bunch seems perfectly happy to mix the unimportant with the important. Surely it is important for Americans to know who the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court is. But is it important for Americans to know when TV broadcasts will switch over to digital or just how many children this year will see their parents divorce? Don't think so.

.....At least one of Newsweek's questions was incoherent:

• In which of the following areas do you think stem cell research would be MOST useful?


17 Spinal injuries

4 Brain injuries

2 Blindness

69 In all of these areas

8 Don't know

.....According to Newsweek's pollsters, SC research will be “most" useful in all three of the three areas named.
.....That makes no fucking sense.

.....Some of the poll's results are appalling, I suppose:

• 34% of respondents thought that Saddam Hussein was directly involved in the 9-11 attacks, and 10% didn't know. (It is, of course, a crucial fact of our present political reality that many Americans were misled about this by the Bush Administration. How can 44% still be out to lunch?)
• 44% of respondents didn’t know the importance of Mecca to Muslims.

"KNOWING" FALSELY: THE CONFIDENT BOOB FACTOR

.....It’s one thing to not know something and to know that one does not know. It is quite another—it is far worse—to “know” something falsely.
.....With regard to the question of the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, 84% didn’t know the answer (John Roberts), but the vast majority of these people knew that they didn’t know. (I'm impressed.) The rate of “false knowing” was only 7%.
.....BUT—now look at many of the other questions. Very often, one finds a very high rate of “false knowing” (i.e., a high rate of confident boobery). For instance, consider this question:

• China and India have the largest armies in the world. Which one of the following countries do you think has the THIRD largest army?


.....I don’t know about you, but I would be very clear that I just don’t know the answer to this question. I could guess (I would have been wrong), but why would I do that? My answer is: I don’t know.
.....Here’s how people answered:

29 North Korea

22 Russia

39 United States

1 Australia

9 Don't know

.....I’m impressed that 29% got this one right. 9% acknowledged their ignorance. Those people are like me.
.....Now, assuming that respondents were aware that they could just say “I don’t know” (is that a bad assumption?), the data here suggest that 62% (i.e., 22+39+1) of respondents had “false knowledge.” 9% knew that they didn't know, but Sixty-freakin'-two percent thought they knew when in fact they did not know.
.....Who are these people? Where do they come from? HOW CAN I AVOID LIVING AMONG THEM?