One In Four Americans Thinks The Sun Orbits The Earth

One In Four Americans Thinks The Sun Orbits The Earth

You might want to be sitting down for this one...

Just read that again...

An incredible 26% of people surveyed by the American Association for the Advancement of Science appear to be completely unaware a fundamental truth first proposed in 1543 by Nicolaus Copernicus.

And it doesn't stop there - only 48% think that human beings "developed from earlier species of animals", or "evolution" as it were.

The Big Bang theory also took a hammering with a paltry 39% thinking the universe began with a huge explosion.

More encouragingly for our trans-atlantic cousins, 84% know that the centre of the Earth is very hot and 83% know the continents have been moving for millions of years.

But we Europeans shouldn't smirk too much - a survey conducted in the EU in 2005 found 66% of people thought the Sun orbited the Earth.

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