Sorry, but that question just doesn’t make any sense. Concrete is a 3-dimensional problem, not 2-dimensional. The question should read something along the lines of:

“If you have an area 20 ft. by 20 ft. by 6 in. deep, how much concrete do you need to fill the area?” The answer is: 20 ft. x 20 ft. x .5 ft = 200 cubic ft.

Sorry to nitpick as I realise you were only trying to illustrate the point that the multiple choice answers were missing the necessary units of measure… but this *is* a science-oriented site

Here’s a true anecdote, to illustrate the point about the difference between using reason and simply “learning facts”.
Some years ago, I attended an open-air boxing event, which was held on a July evening in the grounds of Cardiff Castle. The Castle has two entrances, north and south, and each ticket said on it, “Enter by North Gate” or “Enter by South Gate”, depending on where your seat was.
I was waiting by the South Gate, for the gate to be opened – this was at 6 p.m. on a summer evening, with a cloudless sky – when two guys came along, looking at their tickets in puzzlement, and one wondered aloud, “Is this the North or South Gate?” Because there wasn’t actually a sign by the gate, saying “South Gate”, they were unable to work it out…
I resisted the temptation to say anything to them, but I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. These people were evidently incapable of applying a simple bit of logic, i.e. “It’s 6 p.m., and there’s the Sun – so that way is west. So if I stand with the Sun to my left, then in front of me is north.”
DUHHH!!!!!!!!
Now I find it extremely hard to believe, that anyone could possibly not KNOW that the Sun rises in the east and sets in the west – but I guess people must simply regard that as a “fact”, which they learned at school, and then never gave it another thought. It clearly doesn’t occur to them that such a “fact” can actually be put to a practical use in their lives, such as for finding directions! Some people are just totally ignorant of the entire concepts of logic and reasoning, i.e. of using known facts to deduce unknown ones!

That is not science, at least not to me. That is the process of evaluating information critically. Because if that process, in and of itself, makes something science, I’d like to know why I have a B.A. in history instead of a B.S. despite the evaluation of evidence and claims being at the core of history.

For me, science is about describing the universe and predicting things based on that description. Evaluating information isn’t how you make those descriptions, it’s how you weed out the ones that don’t work.

I got the best compliment ever this year from a student I had taught the previous year in one of my earth/space science classes. She was taking chemistry from one of our notoriously demanding (in a good way) chemistry teachers and she thanked me for helping her do well in chemistry. I said something to the effect that, well, I don’t teach much chemistry in my class and she said, “No, but you taught me how to think”. As I said, best compliment EVER.

Are there weak science teachers? Is there too much “teaching to the standardized test” going on? Obviously, but please don’t paint with quite such a broad brush.

PS to coolstar: To me, Tyson’s value is as a promoter and evangelist for science. Re-read post #1 to see an example of the lack of correlation between being a world-class scientist and being able to effectively communicate with the public.

Neil Tyson is to Astronomy what Kenny G is to Jazz.

And before all you fanboys get your knickers in a twist, yeah, Tyson does do some good (hell, some people LIKE Kenny G) but
a) he really isn’t a very good astronomer (do a NASA ADS search and drop the book reviews, for a somewhat simplistic first cut) and b) I hate the self-aggrandizement.

Let the stoning begin….