why I hate verification questions

[jonrpatrick]

So, joining tonight you have a verification question:
what color is the sky?

Seems simple enough, right?

And it is... but sometimes other people have crazy stuff - and what struck me about this one is the fact I'm COLOR BLIND!
I don't always see colors the way you do.
If the question had been - What Color is Grass - I could have honestly answered 'burnt orange' and been completely truthful but not allowed to join!
LOL

[Geek-9pm]

How about this:
How many toes on your left foot?

That would be unfair for people who can not count!

[Quantos]

I'm just wondering what the purpose of this thread is.

[BC_Programmer]

If the question had been - What Color is Grass - I could have honestly answered 'burnt orange' and been completely truthful but not allowed to join!

Actually, no. Even if you saw grass as burnt orange, that's your perception. The actual colour is still green. The question wasn't "what colour does grass look like to you".

Besides, with the grass question- you just google it, or something. "what colour is the grass" "green" plop it in, done. The idea is to prevent automated spambots, not people with cognition who can figure out that the answer doesn't have to come from them and they have other faculties to draw upon, such as looking up the answer.

[Geek-9pm]

I though he said "what is the color of glass?"   

There is more at stake here.

Those verification tests are difficult for some of us. They make it difficult for us to enjoy the Internet because we have difficulty answering some of the questions they asked to verify who we are.

And consider the fact that he in addition to being colorblind, some people are legally blind and have difficulty reading figures or numbers. And some of us are dyslexic, we have a hard time telling left from right and we juxtaposition letters and numbers. Then there is cultural differences. And also *censored* bias.

What is needed is a verification system that is simple, easy and politically correct.
 Any ideas?   

[JJ 3000]

Then there is cultural differences. And also *censored* bias.

Interesting.
How is the question sexually biased?

I can understand how it might be culturally biased. Color differences are not as universally accepted as you might think. For example, the Choctaw Indians made no distinction between blue and green. The Choctaws did make a linguistic distinction between "okchamali", a vivid green or blue, and "okchakko", a pale green or blue. A Choctaw may, in fact, get the question wrong.

The word "green" and the very concept of color is rather arbitrary. Light comes in a continuum of wavelengths and there is no special distinction to the wavelengths that we call "green." If you were trying to explain what "green" means to a creature from another planet, you would have to say something like "Green is what most earthlings experience when we view light at wavelengths greater than 4912 angstrom units but less than 5750 angstrom units." Does that sound sensible? Why between 5750 and 4912? To someone who had no concept of color this would sound quite odd.

So, I concede that the question can be culturally biased, but how sexually? Can you elaborate?

Now to

So, joining tonight you have a verification question:
what color is the sky?

That doesn't seem like a fair question. The sky can take on a variety of hues even going to pink at sunset. The night sky is black. I know black isn't a color, it's a shade, so if I were to be asked this question at midnight I would be perfectly justified in responding that it has no color.
The verification question is ambiguous.

[BC_Programmer]

The word "green" and the very concept of color is rather arbitrary. Light comes in a continuum of wavelengths and there is no special distinction to the wavelengths that we call "green." If you were trying to explain what "green" means to a creature from another planet, you would have to say something like "Green is what most earthlings experience when we view light at wavelengths greater than 4912 angstrom units but less than 5750 angstrom units." Does that sound sensible? Why between 5750 and 4912? To someone who had no concept of color this would sound quite odd.

Thankfully, the question isn't aimed at creatures in another planet, but rather people here. Do you seriously think that a Choctaw indian would respond to the question "What colour is grass" or "What colour is the sky" with an answer other then green or blue? I don't even think I can find an expletive to fully express how ridiculous things like this can get. God forbid we use or make a reference to <Colour> because it's taboo to <obscure religion or culture>. This is all forgetting that the question is aimed at people who understand english and if they don't understand the language well enough to know basic colours then they may as well not bother posting since nobody is going to understand them to begin with.

what color is the sky?

Now to That doesn't seem like a fair question. The sky can take on a variety of hues even going to pink at sunset. The night sky is black. I know black isn't a color, it's a shade, so if I were to be asked this question at midnight I would be perfectly justified in responding that it has no color.
The verification question is ambiguous.

It's a perfectly fair question and it's not ambiguous at all. Some people have a tendency to over analyze and out pedant questions in the interest of somehow gaining favour to the pedanticism god. When somebody says "Why is the sky blue" everybody knows exactly what they mean. And yet, when that rather elementary musing is turned into a captcha question, suddenly the entire thing becomes steeped in neuroses, and takes on an almost existential and philosophical meaning. Basically, if the question was something like "What sound does a Cow make" and the correct answer was "moo" somebody would complain that their deaf stepsister couldn't properly answer the question. So the question get's changes to "What is the stereotypical colouring of a cow?" And then people will complain that their Blind Aunt couldn't answer the question. So they might change the question to "Does a Cow have Fur or Hair?" but then somebody would complain that their third cousin twice-removed suffered extensive neural trauma and wouldn't be able to feel the difference. It's a huge load of nonsense.

I had a paragraph in the original "draft" of my previous post, but I removed it before submitting it. The way I see it, a person designing a site is not responsible for the people who visit it. If the people who visit my site have some disability whereby they cannot read the analog clock I had as a captcha, then I really don't care. Can't tell two specific colours apart on my main page? Not my problem. I'm not redesigning my page just because somebody tried to guilt me into it with their disability. I know several people who have Red-Green colour blindness, and they are drivers. Thing is, you don't see people petitioning traffic comptrollers to change the colours of traffic signals just to make it so people who have Red-Green colour blindness can distinguish them easier, Because they recognize that the flaw is inherently theirs; if they were to successfully petition them they'd just end up with a set of colours that doesn't work for some other seldom heard subset of the population.

[jason2074]

I'm just wondering what the purpose of this thread is.

The sky will clear up soon... 

[JJ 3000]

Thankfully, the question isn't aimed at creatures in another planet, but rather people here. Do you seriously think that a Choctaw indian would respond to the question "What colour is grass" or "What colour is the sky" with an answer other then green or blue?

Of course not. It would be ludicrous for any sane individual to believe that. There are only a handful of native Choctaw speakers on the planet, and of that handful, I'm sure that 99% of them also know English.

I was speaking generally to the statement made by Geek-9pm. I read his statement and began musing on how the question could possibly be construed as being culturally biased. After puzzling over it for a minute, the only reasonable context in which I could imagine the statement might be true was in the case of someone (or in the case of the E.T., something) that has an entirely different concept of color. I then remembered reading about how the Choctaw used the same words for blue and green. I included that in my far-fetched argument as an extreme example of how the question might be construed as being culturally biased. Surely, you must have realized that I didn't truly believe that there could ever be a scenario where a non-English speaking Choctaw, or a creature from another world, would actually try to sign up here at computer hope. The very idea is absurd! I was simply trying to make a case for Geek-9pms argument.

I was hoping for Geek-9pm to respond with one of his pearls of wisdom and enlighten us as to how the question could be sexually biased. I love reading his brilliant responses. Please Geek-9pm, tell us how.

It's a perfectly fair question and it's not ambiguous at all. Some people have a tendency to over analyze and out pedant questions in the interest of somehow gaining favour to the pedanticism god. When somebody says "Why is the sky blue" everybody knows exactly what they mean. And yet, when that rather elementary musing is turned into a captcha question, suddenly the entire thing becomes steeped in neuroses, and takes on an almost existential and philosophical meaning. Basically, if the question was something like "What sound does a Cow make" and the correct answer was "moo" somebody would complain that their deaf stepsister couldn't properly answer the question. So the question get's changes to "What is the stereotypical colouring of a cow?" And then people will complain that their Blind Aunt couldn't answer the question.

There is a difference. Through no disability, other than a penchant to border on the pedantic, did I arrive at my conclusion. In your examples the person who has the trouble identifying the answer to the questions has some sort of physical disability that prevents them from knowing. The point I was trying to make there, is that the verification questions need to be universally accepted as having only one correct response. I like your idea of using a clock. It seems to be a less ambiguous way to go about it.

[reddevilggg]

Everything BC said +1

except

The way I see it, a person designing a site is not responsible for the people who visit it.

Can you tell that to my Web Design tutor.

[Allan]

Well, I guess the "*censored* bias" is because only men can be color blind - though it sounds as though the poster in this case is actually "color ignorant" (he can see colors but his brain confuses them). I have a friend who is an ex-cop who is color ignorant and has some great stories about his days on the force (for example, a BOLO would be issued for a light green Chevy Impala and he'd have to stop every Chevy Impala and ask for the registration to see what color the car was ).

[Geek-9pm]

This response is by dictation, so some of the grammar or pork have a very maybe very strange.
Now about the *censored* bias inherent in the color question. When asked to name the color of common objects, men tend to use the most direct answer taking from a simple list of the common colors. Women, on the other hand, will be much more verbose. They prefer to be more exact in expressing their perception of color. Perhaps because women have a linguistic advantage over men and that appears to genetic. Also, women spend more time at home raising children and showing their interest in style, appearance, decor  and fashion. They are taught to be more precise when talking about color.
Furthermore, the sky is not simply blue. Although that appears very often in English literature, there are other references for the sky other than simply blew. It could be called sky-blue, azure* or even baby blue . Maybe I would call it like blue, but then I'm a male.
Now about the analog clock. That has to be the most flagrant arrogance of British culture. It were the Brits that forced this concept on the whole world. Although the idea of a sundial may have started in Babylon. If civilization had began south of the equator, the clock whorl might go the other way. If the Auzies #become aware of this, they may even rebel and reveres the direction of all clocks in Australia.

*Azure is 210 degrees on the color wheel.
# Auzies on You Tube

[BC_Programmer]

Also, women spend more time at home raising children and showing their interest in style, appearance, decor  and fashion. They are taught to be more precise when talking about color.

Speaking of sexist... 

Furthermore, the sky is not simply blue. Although that appears very often in English literature, there are other references for the sky other than simply blew. It could be called sky-blue, azure* or even baby blue

No. It's blue. sky-blue, azure, baby bluem navy blue,etc- those are all blue. *censored*, at night the sky isn't black, it's a very very very dark blue. (well, maybe not right at midnight, but usually there is some like coming from one of the horizons that colours the sky)

Now about the analog clock. That has to be the most flagrant arrogance of British culture.
 It were the Brits that forced this concept on the whole world.

 Although the idea of a sundial may have started in Babylon. If civilization had began south of the equator, the clock whorl might go the other way. If the Auzies #become aware of this, they may even rebel and reveres the direction of all clocks in Australia.

And if John F. Kennedy was actually a female born to the name Jenny F. Kennedy she would have never been president and therefore australians would have a lifetime of wearing silly hats to look forward to. Sorry I was following your logic of proposing a "What if" scenario, providing one sensible effect of that scenario and then making something up about Australians.

[JJ 3000]

If civilization had began south of the equator, the clock whorl might go the other way.

You mean err... counter-clockwise?

What about vertical sundials? The shadows whirl round the opposite direction on those.
I thought that the left to right motion was decided on in accordance with the convention of reading English from left to right. Is that wrong?

[Geek-9pm]

Thank you for your response,
Little bit of research on the subject indicates that the clock face is from the sundial, and the sundial was developed in the Northern Hemisphere. If you are in the Northern Hemisphere with the sundial, you'll have to face north and put the sundial in front of you. Then at  at 12 o'clock position on the sundial should be pointing north. At noontime will be a short shadow to the north. In the morning sun rises on the east and the shadow of the sundial will be to your left .  And when in the evening sunsets in the West of course, in the shadow of the sundial will be on your right. The numbers were added to the sundial in a range to read from left to right . But for  some reason noon is 12 o'clock, and I'm not sure how that came about. I think the Romans had something to do with that. Anyway, the sundial may date back to the time of the Babylonians. If not, the Egyptians certainly had some  kind of sundials.
But if civilization has started on the south side of the imaginary line that goes around the circumference of planet, and to assume the country of Ecuador, we would have clock faces that read the other way.