First, you are confusing lack of intelligence with ignorance. A person can be intelligent, but ignorant of basic facts. It's not terribly common in our society, where basic education is afforded to most, but it's a distinction that needs to be made.
Second, the fact that more women got the answer wrong doesn't tell you anything about the average intelligence of each gender. What if women's intelligence distribution has a greater variance? There could be a bigger number of women (compared to men) at the extreme ends of the intelligence spectrum. I don't believe that's the case, but the "argument" you present is far from "convincing".
It's an individual fact, certainly, but it has greater implications for a person's understanding of the world. A professor I knew in college taught a non-majors general biology class, and every semester he put this question on- order according to size, the following: cell, organism, atom, molecule, organ. Apparently this was a very difficult question for them, and it expresses a fundamental lack of understanding of how things work. If they don't know that the Earth is smaller than the Sun, then how can they understand that the Earth is a satellite of the Sun?
>What if women's intelligence distribution has a greater variance?
Sure. But if anything, it has a smaller variance (if there is a difference; the "greater" male variance hypothesis is a bit under fire recently.)
Perhaps smart women are less likely to use the site than smart men. I have heard that more men than women use dating sites, so the intelligence distributions are also probably different.
Not really. Whether or not a system is a satellite relationship is based on their comparative masses and orbits. If the Sun where the less massive we would refer to it as the satellite (well, there would be a lot more consequences, but that's one). If the objects were approximately equal we would call it a binary system with the more massive being referred to as the primary.
The question is actually difficult because an organism can be an microorganism or an animal with organs, so it's impossible to say which ones bigger. Also i'd say if you don't know that the earth is bigger than the sun than you most likely don't know how gravity works, and not that the earth is a satellite of the Sun.
The question is actually difficult because an organism can be an microorganism or an animal with organs, so it's impossible to say which ones bigger.
Only if you allow for comparisons between life forms. If you assume that he's speaking of a single life form that contains all the systems then the question is well-defined.
Second, the fact that more women got the answer wrong doesn't tell you anything about the average intelligence of each gender. What if women's intelligence distribution has a greater variance? There could be a bigger number of women (compared to men) at the extreme ends of the intelligence spectrum. I don't believe that's the case, but the "argument" you present is far from "convincing".