Agreed, so I took a vote each way for "true love" :-)

I'd expect a programmer to understand how it is interpreted as roughly equivalent to "Which is (the most) real?" — just think of "it" as a variable! Sure, it doesn't start with a dollar sign, but not all variables are in Perl.

it = "Bigfoot";
print "Is it real?";
[download]

output:
Is Bigfoot real?

That would explain why voting for Bigfoot would be voting for "Is Bigfoot real?", but does not explain why such a vote would be interpretted as voting for "Bigfoot is real". If people appeared to be interpretting the poll as "I most like to question the reality of _", then I might buy your argument. As is, it looks like "logic as a second language". ;)

- tye        

Ah, but: keep in mind that in Perl (as well as some other languages) having any positive value at all causes a variable to evaluate as "true" when tested for "truth". Thus, a vote for "Is Bigfoot real?" assigns it a value that evaluates as "true", aka "yes".

Or something.

DWIM, darn you! DWIM!

print substr("Just another Perl hacker", 0, -2);

- apotheon CopyWrite Chad Perrin

It asks about the reality of something; without listing what that something refers to. Then it lists a bunch of things that some people believe are real, and others don't.

What if I believe in everything on the list except two are real? I would probably vote for one of them -- but which one?

What if I believe that nothing on the list except two are real? Again, I would probably vote for one of them -- and again, which one should I vote for?

It's a bad poll. It doesn't present a set of mutually exclusive options with an opinion-based decision critera to choose among them; which is the whole point of a poll.

You're taking this whole poll thing waaaay too seriously. Next, you'll complain it's not scientific.

(For the record, I don't care for the polls, so I simply don't vote for them. That doesn't mean I whine about the things I don't like about 'em - I just change the channel and move on. Obviously, I read the replies once in a while, especially when I don't remember that the thread is a poll instead of a SoPW or Meditation.)

You're taking this whole poll thing waaaay too seriously.

Basic spelling, grammar, and logic are the minimum requirements for proper social interaction: it's rude to force other people to guess at your meaning, to be deliberately unclear, or to speak or reason incorrectly; it suggest that you don't care enough about your peers to spend the time to do it right.

I don't know what's happening to people's manners and morals, but it isn't good.