Tuesday, 22 May 2007

How much is 6 times 8? Now, name a vegetable

A reader provides me with more evidence on the inefficiency of the human mind's random object generator.

Ask someone to perform some simple mental arithmetic (how much is 16+25? How much is 48 divided by four?) and then ask them to name a vegetable.

I've tried this on seven people so far today, and the answer was always the same: 'carrot'.
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4 comments:

  1. michelle2 June 2007 at 17:04

    Hi,
    I tested this on my husband just now. And his answer was "carrot". Is there any reason why?

    ReplyDelete
  2. datacharmer2 June 2007 at 17:16

    Hi Michelle

    No idea! It just seems to work on everyone.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Helena de Groot25 July 2007 at 05:34

    I think it's an example of 'prototype theory', where a carrot is just the most 'typical' vegetable in our culture, just as 7 or 3 is the most typical random number, or a chair the most typical piece of furniture. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prototype_Theory

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  4. Anonymous9 March 2008 at 22:31

    My dad said Rutabaga.

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