The Art of Being Wrong Trivia Quiz

Answer: All of these

William Thomson, 1st Baron of Kelvin, was a man of great significance in the scientific world; a pioneer of the electric telegraph and the creator of the Kelvin scale of absolute temperature.

However, it is his position as President of the Royal Society that makes him interesting. The Royal Society, or to give it its full title "The Royal Society of London for the Improvement of Natural Knowledge", is England's most prestigious body of scientists. Previous Presidents include Christopher Wren, Isaac Newton and Humphry Davy. Lord Kelvin's elevation to the position gave him the opportunity to exercise his great skills as an oracle of the future world and he put it to marvellous use.

The quality of his predictions got off to, well, a flying start with his prediction in 1895 that "Heavier than air flying machines are impossible". It was a mere eight years before Orville and Wilbur Wright proved Arthur C. Clarke's first Law: "When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong."

It is particularly remarkable that Kelvin should have been so dismissive of X-rays as they were first discovered by a member of the Royal Society, William Morgan, more than 100 years before Kelvin was elevated to the Presidency.

It was considerate of the radio broadcasters to at least wait until Lord Kelvin had passed away before demonstrating that his appreciation of future trends was as accurate as his view of future scientific endeavour.

Answer: Bill Gates

I couldn't even open the FunTrivia website with that little memory! The average amount of RAM on new home PCs sold now is well over 1Gb. The fact that such high achievers as Mr. Gates can stumble blindly into the future of technology and make their billions ought to give hope to us all. Gates, to be fair to him, has always strenuously denied ever saying this.

Less deniable was another staggeringly accurate prediction that Bill gave us two years later at the launch of Microsoft's MSX computer. His assertion that "[Microsoft] will never make a 32 bit operating system" was contradicted ten years later when Windows NT 3.1 was released.

Answer: "It doesn't matter what he does, he will never amount to anything."

Einstein was quite successful at school but was never happy there as the requirement for memorised learning was not to his liking. However, his teacher's prediction seems particularly short-sighted, nevertheless.

Having failed to find work teaching in universities, Einstein took a job in the patent office in Bern, Switzerland. It was whilst working at the patent office in 1905, that the "Annalen der Physik" published four papers authored by him that are collectively known as the "Annus Mirabilis Papers". Though they received little attention at the time, the papers are now considered to be remarkable. They introduced, amongst other theories, the special theory of relativity for which Einstein is perhaps popularly best known. Subsequently Einstein developed the general theory of relativity which led to a new theory of gravitation, finally updating the theory hypothesized by Isaac Newton in his "Principia" in 1687.

In 1921, Einstein was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics "For services to theoretical physics and especially for the discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect" and in 1999 he was voted "Person of the Century" by "Time Magazine".

Answer: Lord Byron

The quote comes from a letter Byron wrote to Scottish poet, James Hogg. Whilst in the same letter Byron admits that "[Shakespeare] did write some flashes of genius" he berates him as lacking inventiveness and writing with "little expense of thought". Whatever you may feel about Byron's opinions it is clear that his prediction of the fall of Shakespeare from the canon of literary greats is considerably wide of the mark.

Shakespeare was not alone in feeling Byron's wrath. He was no fan of his contemporaries, Southey, Wordsworth or Coleridge, either, deriding them in his 1819 epic poem "Don Juan" as self-obsessed and narrow-minded poets.

Byron was never one for convention. Born with a club foot about which he was extremely sensitive, he had his first volume of poetry published in 1807. It was after the publication of "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" in 1812 that Byron "awoke one morning and found [himself] famous." With this fame came a prurient interest in his personal affairs, an interest that was stoked by numerous well-publicised affairs such as that with Lady Caroline Lamb which shocked society. More shocking still was the presumed affair with his half-sister Augusta Leigh which, when rumours were circulated about it, prompted Byron to leave England in 1816, never to return.

In his self-imposed exile, Byron became a supporter of political causes such as Italian nationalism and Greek independence, believing action to be more important than writing. Whilst he may not have been accurate about Shakespeare's future reputation, his own improved long after his death. Unappreciated in England in his lifetime, though a hero in Greece, his influence in the world of literature has proved to be considerable.

Answer: Dewey defeats Truman

Results on the night were coming in very slowly and "The Tribune" had its deadline fast approaching. They took a gamble based on the early results that had come in. These showed a lead for Dewey and the decision was made to go ahead with the now famous headline. The paper was clearly rushed out; corrections were left in the paper with the old text simply typed over with rows of x's and five lines of the far right column were printed upside down.

When later results came in, it became apparent that "The Tribune" had got it wrong. Staff were sent out to try and retrieve the incorrect editions from the newsstands and though many were, many copies had already been delivered to customers.

The next morning, on hearing the true result, Truman travelled to Washington by train. When the train stopped at St Louis, Missouri, Truman was presented with a copy of the paper with the incorrect headline. He held up the paper on the back platform of the train and one of the iconic images of the 20th century was snapped.

Answer: The Beatles

Maybe they had a point. However, consider the collected success of the four bands mentioned above, a combined total of 29 UK number ones and 28 US number ones (The Beatles had 6 US number ones in 1964 alone), and you'd probably have to conclude - maybe not. The harvest of this decision by Decca was reaped by German label Parlophone, for whom producer George Martin signed the band.

The Beatles are the most successful chart band in history worldwide and have indisputably changed the face of popular music thanks to the profound influence they had on young musicians around the world in the early 1960s and since. Amongst their most remarkable achievements is holding all of the top five positions on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart at the same time in April 1964 and the song, "Yesterday", is listed by "The Guinness Book of Records" as "the most covered song in history" with more than 3,000 recorded versions.

Answer: Gone With the Wind

Clark Gable was so right for the part of Rhett Butler that it seems inconceivable that anyone else could have been considered for the role, but Gary Cooper was apparently the first choice for the role with Errol Flynn and Ronald Colman also considered. Cooper was apparently very fussy about the quality of his scripts; in the same year as "Gone with the Wind" he also turned down "Stagecoach".

In later years, Cooper modified his story about his rejection of the role; "Rhett Butler was one of the best roles ever offered in Hollywood and my screen character saw himself emerging from the film as a dashing-type fellow. But I said no. I didn't see myself as quite that dashing, and later, when I saw Clark Gable play the role to perfection, I knew I was right."

Far from being the flop that Cooper predicted, "Gone With the Wind" became one of the greatest box office successes in cinema history. It also won Best Picture at the Academy Awards for 1939, one of eight Oscars it received. Clark Gable was nominated for Best Actor but lost out to Robert Donat in "Goodbye, Mr Chips".

Answer: Margaret Thatcher

Contradicting oneself is not unusual for a politician of course, but it seems strange that such a forceful personality as Thatcher should have shown such a lack of faith in her ability. Thatcher challenged existing Conservative Party leader, Edward Heath, in 1975 having been put forward as the stalking horse candidate. Thatcher showed much more strongly in the initial ballot then anyone predicted, outpolling Heath, and the momentum she had gained carried through to the second round of voting in which she won the leadership battle.

Four years later, the Labour government of Jim Callaghan toiled and spluttered through the "Winter of Discontent" as unemployment rose and public services succumbed to strike action. He suffered the rare ignominy of being thrown out of office on a vote of no confidence. Thatcher was swept to power with a Conservative majority of 44 in the House of Commons, thus becoming the first female Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. It was the first of three election wins for the Tories under Thatcher before she was deposed in a style similar to that which she inflicted on Heath. It brought an end to eleven years in power for Thatcher, a period in which she inspired devotion and loathing in equal measure.

One year after Thatcher's election as Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi was elected as Prime Minister of India for the second time, having become the country's first female Prime Minister in 1966. Edith Cresson was France's first female Prime Minister, rising to the office in 1991 and Jenny Shipley became the first female Prime Minister of New Zealand in 1997.

Answer: Montreal

Mayor Jean Drapeau became pregnant five months later. No, actually he didn't, but his prediction turned out to be spectacularly untrue as the Montreal games posted a staggering loss of over two billion dollars. The debt that Montreal owed was finally paid off in 2006.

Answer: "They couldn't hit an elephant at this distance"

Those were the last words that Gen. Sedgwick would ever utter. Some reports suggest that his last sentence was ironically cut short by a Confederate sharp-shooter's bullet although this may well be comedic license.

Sedgwick commanded the Sixth Corps of the Army of the Potomac at the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House and was attempting to line up his troops in some rifle-pits when a smatter of fire from the opposing sharp-shooters forced the soldiers to hit the deck. Sedgwick commanded that they continue to move along the pits so that they were not overlapping the artillery alongside. As the corps obeyed his command, more fire rang out causing several of them to start dodging the bullets.

Sedgwick responded to this sight by uttering in an apparently jocular tone, "What! what! men, dodging this way for single bullets! What will you do when they open fire along the whole line? I am ashamed of you. They couldn't hit an elephant at this distance." Despite this friendly admonishment, the men continued to dodge and the General repeated the phrase again. Shortly afterwards he was felled by a bullet causing the death of the highest ranking Union soldier to fall in the whole of the Civil War.