I went to the Museum of the University of Tromso on Sunday. There was a new exhibit on evolution. The museum is sort of interactive so every so often there was a touchscreen that showed something or other and then allowed visitors to vote on a burning question related to the nearest display case such as 'Do you believe that apes and humans are descended from a common ancestor?' The first screen, however, was a language selection screen, on which visitors had to choose either Norwegian or English. So after one voted on a given question, one was shown the voting results for people who responded in Norwegian and English separately. For each of these questions, the English respondents gave less "liberal" answers than did the Norwegian ones. So, more English respondents thought we and apes are descended from a common ancestor than thought we are not, but fewer English respondents agreed than did Norwegian ones. A greater minority of English respondents than Norwegian respondents thought that farming should be given precedence over wild animals. The funniest question asked was "Do you think the pigeons in Tromso center should be persecuted?" The English and Norwegian respondents were similarly distributed on that.

The English respondents are clearly tourists. The type of tourist that comes to Tromso is an affluent kind of tourist. Maybe someone who is a little less concerned about the rights of the natural environment to flourish with as little human interference as possible. Funny.