Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for June 16, 2024

What percentage of Americans don’t understand percentages?

99 percent of living beings are smarter than Pig.

I just have to ask, was GOAT crying out of frustration or sadness?! Dan aka…

The percent of Americans that dont know percents are, YES.

How many still believe the supremes (supreme court) are not bought and paid for?

Look up “America’s Not The Greatest Country” speech from The Newsroom on YouTube. Quite sad, but very true.

I also read that 50% of people don’t know approximately how long it takes the Earth to rotate around the Sun.

Yeah, the broken education system is part of it, but right now I’m fixated on the judicial dictatorship of America with the corruption at the top. What if nonpartisan Justices could compel partisan Justices to recuse?

100% of pigs can’t fly! Look it up!

Pop quiz

(Yes, I know it’s the weekend, there’s a pop quiz anyway)

Given the percentages in the strip, what percentage of Americans don’t know that the earth orbits the sun, and cannot name the three branches of government, and don’t know the difference between astronomy and astrology, and don’t know who delivered the Gettysburg Address, and haven’t read a book in the past twelve months?

No fair googling the answer or using an online percentage calculator.

Ignorance is bliss they say!

I feel oddly comforted in knowing I was on the right side of the percentages that Goat is talking about. I know it doesn’t make me a genius or anything, but at least Goat isn’t crying any tears for me.

When asked about the difference between ignorance and apathy, 42% of Americans will say, “I don’t know, and I don’t care.”

A third of Americans aren’t Americans.

Some very large age of the "N of Americans don’t know ***" pearl-clutching is rubbish; people never need to know such trivia except when playing Trivial Pursuit or similar

Jay Leno used to have a segment where he’d ask people questions and get stupid answers. He even had a Jeopardy-type contest with admittedly-ignorant contestants. One example:

Jay: Who wrote Handel’s “Messiah”?   Contestant (shaking his head): I don’t read books.

I guess we need to put percentages back in the indoctrination agenda lesson plan.

This must be fake news, Goat. That adds up to 179% – there aren’t even tat many Americans alive today!

Pig to Goat: “Hey, Goat; while you’re trying to learn me percentages, can you borrow me a book on grammar?”

Just so you know:Legislative—Makes laws (Congress, comprised of the House of Representatives and Senate)Executive—Carries out laws (president, vice president, Cabinet, most federal agencies)Judicial—Evaluates laws (Supreme Court and other courts).

I didn’t read a book this year because my eyesight was too bad! Finally got an appt w/eye specialist, yay!

Democrat teachers with democrat administrators working for democrat-led schoolboards have produced kids that are quite ignorant.

So an average of 30% of Americans are ignorant. What a coincidence that approximately 30% of Americans are MAGA Republicans.

Very surprised 49% have read a book. I would have bet 75% have not read a book since high school/college, especially a book with more words than pictures.

“51% of Americans haven’t read a book” in the past year. That’s not as bad as it sounds. Thanks to the internet and everyone being continuously online, Americans today are likely reading vastly more in a given year, fiction and non-fiction and news, than they ever did back in the old days of books and newspapers and magazines.

This just in : five out of four Americans can’t do fractions.

Sherlock Holmes did not know the earth revolved around the sun and admonished Watson when he told him. Sherlock said he had no use nor reason for knowing such a thing and would try to erase it from brain so he could use the space for something like being able to identify the brand of cigar a person was smoking from just the ash.

I think the 51% who have not read a book in the last year is the saddest.

What percentage believe any statistics that they see in the paper? Or the comics?

Why there should be a test in order to vote

Not the only one crying but the US Empire is laughing.

Great comic. But it does makes one want to cry for our country.

But 100% of Americans know more about gender types than they want to

What percentages of Americans don’t understand the appeal of comic strips?

Goat tried to put the two cents in.

We lived in Gettysburg in two different places. I can still find them; but I couldn’t say their addresses.

As a chemistry prof at a large community college in FL, it amazes me how little many of my kids know as they enter community college with a high school education. A prerequisite of all chemistry courses where I teach (General Chem 1 and 2, Nursing Chem 1 and 2, Organic Chem 1 and 2 and Environmental Chem) is to have passed basic math (algebra and trigonometry), have a suitable score on the community college placement test, or be enrolled in one of the calculus courses offered. In my lab courses, I always make the students do a simple math test, nothing tough, but I make the kids take it without help from their smartphones or calculators. You would be surprised how many students miss a simple multiple choice question like this: “75% of the class liked the movie, the class has 200 students. How many students in the class liked the film? A 75, B. 200 C. 150. D none of the above…..” Most of my students pass this little quiz but there is a fair percentage of them who are lost on numbers without help from their calculator and a few try to tell me that I have to let them use their device to help them, I show them the pre-req (know simple ****ing math) for the course and tell them when the drop-add date is if they do not want to continue……. Good one today Pastis!

Technically, the Earth doesn’t orbit around the sun. It orbits around the barycenter.

I believe that 87% of all statistics are made up on the spot…

And yet, we have well-meaning doofusses who want higher voter turnout.

Not only should they not be trying to shame and cajole more people into voting, they themselves should give it up for a while, until they’ve thought it through.

Yes, Pig, someone was supposed to teach you about percentages.

Look at what percentage votes!

I ran across someone who didn’t know that at the time of the War of 1812, the flag (including the “Star Spangled Banner” over Ft. McHenry at the time the poem was conceived) had 15 stripes. She thought the image of it she saw (the replica that flies over the fort today) was a bad AI job.

What scares me the most is that those are voting Americans. If you don’t know something as basic as the Earth revolving around the sun… I’m very skeptical about you helping to choose our leaders. I’m sorry, but it’s true.

What ‘cult following’ does this describe? Don’t think too hard but they may be wearing a ‘red hat’ and they aren’t Santa Claus or his elves!!

The number of people who haven’t read a book in a year astounds me. I read maybe 5 per week. I will grant that I’m retired so have the time but before that I still read maybe two or three per week. I’m going to be buried with my Kindle so I can read in the afterlife.

I know all that stuff!

I hope Pastis made up those numbers. …and BTW this strip is becoming less and less funny by the year.

This is very sad. I don’t even understand how this happened. All of these things were taught to me in the New York State public school system. My love of reading was instilled in me by my parents example. The ones Goat speaks of are the low information, poorly educated voters that Republicans pander to. I am not an elitist. I don’t have a Bachelor degree. I feel education is a life long process that can be gained by having intellectual curiosity to self educate. That seems o be lacking in too many people.

I think it’s more likely that 26% of Americans enjoy fùcking with pollsters.

Meanwhile, in other countries: some years ago it was published that 24% of British adults, when asked what animal bacon comes from, answered “turkey”.

To be fair, you have to expect them to score poorly on any question involving food.

Homeschooling + STEM

Reminds me of the story about when A&W introduced a “third-pound burger” to compete against McDonald’s quarter pounder; supposedly, it failed because a survey showed most people that that 1/4 pound was larger than 1/3 pound.

Over what age do these polls survey?

Once they started asking to calculate the volume of a sin wave spun 360 degrees on the z axis, I hit the math wall.

I believe Justice Roberts is compromised.

Sounds like the latest high school and college graduating classes. They can tell you about the latest phones.

Good one, Stephan. I don’t get percentages, either.

I read last night that when they were developing the tests that would be used for IQ and SAT tests, they were first used when recruiting for WWI. They found that more than half of those tested met the criteria for feeble-minded. Explains a lot.

Keep your population ignorant so they are easier to control.

Some guy on YouTube shorts was asking college students general knowledge questions. One didn’t know what a country was. Almost everyone else was about as bad. What’s been happening on campuses lately isn’t that surprising.

I learned all these things when I was in school. I don’t know if it’s the education system that’s failing as it is that people are just disinterested in learning these things.

Certain people: “I can’t believe how dumb the average American is today”

Those same people: “You BETTER NOT raise my taxes for the school district! I don’t have kids in school here, why should I pay?”

And that explains the right wing voter. Logic shmogic, I don’t need any facts.

What percent chant “From the river to the sea” and can’t name the river or the sea or place Israel on the map? In Journalism school in the 70’s, on the first day of class prof gave a quiz – a blank map of Europe which the students had to label. It being Minnesota, almost all the students got Norway and Sweden correct – but no others. And the map was a lot easier then. The Soviet Union is now seven different European nations, Yugoslavia is now 7 different nations, and Czechoslovakia split in half. They couldn’t name the UK, Ireland, France or Spain, let alone Andorra or San Marino. They tried to explain that journalists were supposed to be generalists at which point the prof yelled, exasperatedly, “That means you’re supposed to be generally knowledgeable, not completely ignorant. You’re not supposed to be tabulae rasae.”I laughed, being the victim of 12 years of Catholic schooling and three years of Latin classes. I also got 100% on the quiz. So I guess this is nothing new.

And 63%think the economy is terrible when it is actually the best we have had in decades. 51% think unemployment is the highest in 50 years when it is actually the lowest in 70 years. Someone is feeding these folks lies and they are believing them.

Three branches of government: Summary, Special, General. IYKYK

87 percent of statistics are made up on the spot.

All we know about the earth’s shape is taught to us through a gov’t organization, NASA. NASA will share “photos” of the earth, all with excuses of their use of CGI. They can take long range photos of distant planets but can’t do the same for earth. For centuries, the standard map of the world looked like the current logo of the United Nations! The Bible backs up that image, affirming we’re all under a dome firmament and that the 2 luminaries go on assigned paths. Photos from “space” are all done with fish-eye camera lenses, mimicking an earth “curvature” that doesn’t show up when the lens is changed to normal.

Why the conspiracy? Because when NASA “proves” there is no heaven above us, God is banished and gov’t steps into God’s place. That’s why it’s so important we keep in the law that our rights come from our Creator, not from man. Man can change our rights; God will not.

Why is there a treaty between many nations not to study beyond the ice wall they labeled “Antarctica” (which does not appear on UN’s logo)? Why do airline pilots use a flat map to plot their course through the air? Why do space rockets always appear to curl back down into the ocean? Why does Polaris always stay put, despite centuries of speeding through space?

You’ll label me nuts, but if you keep an open mind, there might be something to all this. My God sits on His throne above His creation. I don’t harm anybody by believing this. If you try to shame me (religious bullying), there’s no use trying to “un-doctrinate” or reverse-brainwash me. A greater number of people believing something doesn’t make it truth- if it’s not correct. Imagine telling 25% of the world’s population that Islam is not the truth, just because Christianity is at 31%. Truth is out there, but who gets to “confirm” who’s right? Gov’t? We’re in trouble if it’s that. A one-world gov’t is even scarier.

This certainly helps to explain the MAGA movement.

I understand Goat; Pig’s comment almost made me cry :-(

um…let’s see…3 branches of government…hmm…I can only come up with 2: dictator, and everybody else??

Did you know that 58% of those statistics are completely made up?

Actually, astronomy grew out of astrology.

The same percentage that don’t understand fractions.

Another brilliant commentary from Mr. Pastis on the dumbing down of America — which helps explain the rise of the racial bigotry, antisemitism, and anti-immigrant fervor of today’s radical far right which has kidnapped the once responsible and often reasonable GOP.

The Earth revolves around her axis of rotation. The Earth orbits the sun.

The real problem is not whether people do/don’t understand percentages; it is rather when people can’t tell reality from fiction.

It was just too much for Goat.

And how many “Americans” don’t know that America is two continents and not a single country?

Well, like they always say…

Figures can lie and liars can figure.

Someone told them “ignorance is bliss” and they want to be happy.

42% of statistics are made up on the spot.

Three branches of government, from least powerful to the most powerful, my boss, my mother, my wife.

And many people are unaware that the words “bologna” and “pony” rhyme.

It’s only going to get worse with the rise of AI

The really sad thing is that the same people who complain about too much spending on education also complain about their standard of living going down because no one around them has been taught how to make modern conveniences work.

61% think Donald Trump can do what he darn well pleases without a government

The whole strip today is a sad, but true, commentary on education in our schools.

If those statistics are true, I would like to see them broken down by age.

You may think Pig is stupid, but 75% of the time he’s just messing with Goat

Not the greatest at and learn me that? Eye roll!

Using relativity, you can describe the Sun going around the Earth. Flat Earth is going to take some seriously non-Euclidian geometry, though.

I’m the 10.2%!!