Can you tell which one is more powerful? People are ‘terrible’ at judging facts – see if you can decipher them

Whether it’s tying shoelaces or a tie, most of us use knots every day.

However, research has shown that people are ‘horrible’ at judging facts.

Scientists from Johns Hopkins University showed participants pictures of facts and asked them to say the most powerful.

Surprisingly, he found that many people had difficulty distinguishing between weak and strong points.

‘Humans are terrible at this,’ said Chaz Firestone, a co-author of the study.

‘Humans have been using principles for thousands of years. It’s not that hard – it’s just another cable attached.

‘Yet you can show people real pictures of a policy and ask them to make any judgments about what the policy will look like and they have no idea.’

So can you tell which of these four principles is the most powerful? Scroll down for answers!

The study was led by Sholei Croom, a PhD student who began researching public opinion on policy.

“People are always making predictions about the future of Earth physics but something about the principles just didn’t make sense to me,” Croom said.

‘You don’t have to touch a pile of books to judge its stability.

‘You don’t have to feel like a bowling ball to imagine how many pins will fall.

‘But facts seem to distort our judgments in interesting ways.’

The team enrolled 50 people, who were shown four points and asked to decide which was the strongest.

Physically, all four points were the same, but where they differed was in their power – the power needed to free them.

For example, a rock knot is a very strong knot, while a sad knot can be loosened with a gentle shake.

The results showed that the participants were not always able to identify the strongest point.

To keep things simple, the researchers showed the students pictures of only two concepts and asked them to describe the strongest one.

Again, he couldn’t.

Finally, they showed the participants videos of each point, where the points were slowly rotated so that they could see each side clearly.

Again, the students were unable to choose the strongest point.

‘We tried to give people the best chance we could at the trial, including showing them videos of the circular and it didn’t help at all – if people’s responses were overwhelming across the board,’ Ms Croom said.

‘Human reasoning is simply incapable of proving any physical knowledge from facts.’

Although the reason for their finding is not yet known, the researchers say that objects that are not rigid – such as string or rope – can be difficult for people to think about.

“We can’t extract the inner meaning of a point by looking at it,” added Mr Croom.

‘It’s a great story to explore how many open questions still remain in our ability to think about the universe.’