Can You Guess the Scientist? Unveiling the Results of a Fair Test

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Discussion Overview

The discussion revolves around a quiz where participants guess the names of various scientists based on their images. The focus is on the fairness of the test and the participants' experiences and scores, which vary widely. The conversation includes reflections on guessing strategies and knowledge of the scientists featured.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory
  • Debate/contested
  • Meta-discussion

Main Points Raised

  • Some participants express satisfaction with their scores, noting that they achieved results through a mix of knowledge and guessing.
  • Others mention specific scientists they recognized, such as Katherine Johnson and Sally Ride, attributing their knowledge to popular media or prior learning.
  • Several participants report low scores, indicating that they struggled with the quiz and relied heavily on guessing.
  • Some participants discuss their guessing strategies, including stereotyping based on appearance or matching names with perceived nationalities.
  • A few participants highlight the quiz's fairness, referencing statistical concepts like the expectation value of a binomial distribution in relation to their guessing outcomes.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

There is no consensus on the effectiveness of guessing strategies or the level of knowledge required to perform well on the quiz. Participants have varying experiences and scores, indicating a mix of agreement on the quiz's fairness but disagreement on individual performance and recognition of the scientists.

Contextual Notes

Participants' scores range widely, with some achieving high marks through luck and others expressing frustration at their inability to recognize the scientists. The discussion reflects a variety of knowledge levels and guessing strategies without resolving the effectiveness of these approaches.

Who May Find This Useful

This discussion may be of interest to those curious about public recognition of scientists, the impact of media on science awareness, and the challenges of identifying historical figures based on images.

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Name the Scientist
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At least I can say, that it's a fair test as I confirmed the hypothesis guess under total ignorance and achieve the expectation value of a binomial distributed random variable. :frown:
 
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9 out of 12, not bad considering the guessing. (I still don't know many of them. Time to hit the Google.)
 
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DrClaude said:
9 out of 12, not bad considering the guessing. (I still don't know many of them. Time to hit the Google.)
There is a link to their wiki pages after grading.
 
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I scored 10 out 12. I knew 8 and guessed on 4.
 
Scored 11 out of 12 (I got Katherine Johnson wrong -- I've heard of her name, thanks to the recent film Hidden Figures, but have never seen her real-life earlier photo until taking this quiz).
 
6 :blushing:
The only ones I knew were faraday, Kepler, and Franklin. I hit on Baltimore and Gould by having some vague idea of what sort of a person they were.
 
Last edited:
Ummm...
I'm bad with faces.
I'm also bad with names.
Got 8.
Yay!

(I knew 6, and got lucky on 2)
ps. Apparently my short term memory decline isn't as bad as I suspected, as I got 11/12 the second time around.:partytime:
 
  • #10
I got 7 right. Got all the biologists, made some decent guesses based on matching garb with periods I figured they existed.
 
  • #11
I got the only three I knew,
Faraday, Kepler, and Bose,
and somehow managed to guess incorrectly on the other nine.
 
  • #12
I got the six I knew and missed the six I guessed, which makes me guess that I'm not a good guesser.
 
  • #13
8 of 12, definitely not Sherlock, just sheer luck.
 
  • #14
fresh_42 said:
At least I can say, that it's a fair test as I confirmed the hypothesis guess under total ignorance and achieve the expectation value of a binomial distributed random variable. :frown:
I failed a confidence test at , just about any confidence level, with 7 /12 , though maybe I had some subconscious knowledge helping me increase my p from 1/4 to something higher.
 
  • #15
12 out of 12. But there were 2 stabs in the dark.
 
  • #16
6/12. I thought I was good at recognizing faces of famous people.
 
  • #17
8/12. I was certain about four of them, and got 50% of my guesses right. As I basically went on "(s)he looks like a <name> to me" for the ones I didn't know, that looks like a win for stereotyping. Yay?
 
  • #18
I got 5 out of 12. Sally Ride was a sure thing=on the others I basically got 4 correct out of 11 on a multiple choice test. :) :)
 
  • #19
I got 7 out of 12. I was mostly guessing. I only could answer 2 of them with confidence.
 
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  • #20
I got 7 out of 12, with a lot of guessing. Katherine Johnson, David Baltimore, and Sally Ride were the only ones I was pretty sure about.
 
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  • #21
Ibix said:
8/12. I was certain about four of them, and got 50% of my guesses right. As I basically went on "(s)he looks like a <name> to me" for the ones I didn't know, that looks like a win for stereotyping. Yay?
I don't remember all of them, but several seemed to have names that could go with the apparent nationality of the person. Also, I know of at least a few which the other choices were real people. Maybe all of the choices are real scientists. So you maybe think to yourself "I think I've heard that name. Maybe it's her."
 
  • #22
I confused Galileo with Kepler :( 3/12, so bad. I did ok with Chandrasekhar, Bose and Gould (the last was just by chance).
 
  • #23
7/12..
Knew 5 of them..
Bose, Chandrashekhar, Katherine Johnson (thanks to Hidden Figures), Kepler and Faraday..
 
  • #24
6/12, and all my correct answers were ones I was relatively certain about. Though I suppose that just means I scored below average on guessing on the other 6.
 
  • #25
9 out of 12, three guesses.
 
  • #26
Most of them were guesses, I got 6.
 
  • #27
10/12 No joke. But three were blind guesses I got right. Haha
 
  • #28
fresh_42 said:
At least I can say, that it's a fair test as I confirmed the hypothesis guess under total ignorance and achieve the expectation value of a binomial distributed random variable. :frown:
3/12?
 

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