What do you think should be general knowledge?

[RubyFakeLips]

I have terrible general knowledge. Trivial Pursuits is hell and I completely fail to shout answers along to Mastermind.

I am going to try and improve this, but what is general knowledge?

Capitals of the world? Important dates? Former Prime Ministers?

Help me out, what do you know (in broad terms) that you think everyone should know?

Interesting question.

I think 30 years ago the answer would be different.

I think it would be about facts "everyone" learned at school (which is actually quite cultural), and about things that would be on TV programmes on the 4 (5?) stations we had, and the 'mainstream' sports reported in the newspapers we all read at the time. With music being a combination of the classics you studied at school and the charts, which everyone listened to.

Fast Forward to the 21st Century and everyone has so much more information at their fingertips. So many more sources for news, for politics, for different genres of music, for watching different sports, etc etc.

The questions I always have no idea about are things I have absolutely no interest in, like the bloody family tree of the Kardashian’s.

Just pick things that interest you, the best gen knowledge teams have a variety of interests.

It's difficult to say what people should know. I know things like capital cities and state capitals, chemical symbols, kings and queens, dates of major historic events etc. because I'm a quizzer so I've bothered to remember them - it's not useful everyday knowledge though.

Having said that, deliberately broadening your knowledge in any way is a good thing to help with things like organising your memory and quick recall.

examples.

Africa is a continent, not a country.

The highest mountain isn't Everest its Mauna Kea

Tallest waterfall is Angel Falls

non examples

who is married to kim kardiashian (or any of the ks)

Who's latest tweet sparked a war of (tweeting) words

Which Insta star is a multi millionaire for selling tat

Significant history, geography and politics probably. Some literature. Some popular culture , but probably more universal than current?

How to find out things you don't know.
Manners.
First Aid.
Rights and Responsibilities.

Random lists of facts... Not so much. What you need to know varies a lot from person to person. I know some random stuff from playing quizzes... But not other facts other people know (I'm a bit woolly on Prime Ministers for example... I can do back to the early 90s, my mum thinks everyone should know back to the 60s. She lived through them, I didn't!)

Everyone should know where their main organs are and roughly how our bodies work.
And how to use apostrophes.

The highest mountain isn't Everest its Mauna Kea

I thought Mauna Kea didn’t count as a mountain because it’s a volcano? Happy to be corrected - please elaborate!

How to critically evaluate a source (eg newspaper, tv, person speaking) ... even how to judge if it’s likely to be true or not ... the last year has shown a lot of people are sorely lacking that ability !

And while I’m here - everyone should know that there’s no such thing as common law marriage and if you don’t have your name on the house deeds, you’re basically stuffed.

I think it depends if you're taking it from sea level or from the centre of the earth.

How an oxbow lake is formed.
Great episode in QI where the 3 Brits drew diagrams for the American(?) panelist.

I don't think there is any one area/topic you should know, but you should know something about some things.

I am hopeless at popular culture, music and sport so generally not much good at all in a quiz team. But I do seem to know random things across a wide range of topics that others often don't know. So I may only get a few questions, but they are things no one else in the team knows.

Classic literature, famous paintings and well known classical music always feature heavily in mastermind and uni challenge.

I don't need life skills I've common sense, raised 5 DC, run my own business and survived nearly 5 decades. I am educated to post graduate level in a specific area, but it's niche.

However, I didn't go the traditional route for education, so my knowledge has huge gaps. Don't remember doing anything other than the Vikings and the Egyptians in school history, so can never place world events, I travel but could name maybe 10 capitals. Couldn't point most organs out on a picture if life depended on it. Prime ministers and Royal names elude me. Don't want lots of random facts but would like general knowledge that helps put the world in context.

Anatomy is an excellent category to cover.

Obviously very concerned regarding apostrophes now and am frantically googling oxbow lake!

Work out what interests you and learn that. It's much easier to retain the information when you are following your interests. Then make friends with people who can fill in the gaps.

DH and I have proven to be good quiz partners this last 12 months. We've been together a long time, but had never done a pub/similar quiz together before lockdown #1. We have a lot of cross over knowledge, but he fills in my blanks in sport, history and physics, and I cover his in biology, chemistry, and popular culture. We have different tastes in music and literature, so between us can cover quite a few genres. Our age gap also helps us span a larger period of pop culture.

I love a random/fun fact, and these sorts of things often come up eg wombats do cube-shaped poos.

I am full of pointless general knowledge and know the following:
Countries
Capital cities
US Presidents
UK Prime Ministers
60s-10s music
Films (in general)

Any nonsense I pick up

@HopeClearwater

The highest mountain isn't Everest its Mauna Kea

I thought Mauna Kea didn’t count as a mountain because it’s a volcano? Happy to be corrected - please elaborate!

It's classed as a mountain and it's taller because it's base is underwater. Just a fun fact!

@icanboogieboogiewoogie

"I think it depends if you're taking it from sea level or from the centre of the earth."

The mountain furthest from the centre of the earth is Mount Chimborazo, 2000 meters further than Everest.

Start watching quiz shows- The Chase is a good start. Research any questions you got wrong, try and memorise what you learn.

General knowledge - no hope for any adult who on a clear day with the sun in the sky cannot tell north, south, east or west. Surprising how many do not know that, probably due to some very fluffy education curricula at some point.

It does depend on if you are talking about

"I'm going to do some pub quizzes, what do you think I should swot up on?" - at which point I'd say, like SkankingMopoke and her dp have found, it is all about teaming up with someone, or some people who have different areas of knowledge from yourself

or

"What is useful to help me get through life?" - in which case Aroundtheworldin80moves and nervousashell 's lists are more useful

But if you just want to study 'something' to widen your own knowledge, then pick something that interests you, as there is no particular area that ought to be 'known general knowledge'

Anatomy , physiology , biology , zoology , botany .
Functional DIY .
Nutrition , well-being skills .
Global religions/cults and how they have informed modern life .
Relevant historical events/figures and their impact on modern life.
Cultural stuff ...especially music and its travels around the world .
Capitalism through to Communism .
Where money comes from and where it ends up .

As a long time pub quiz contestant, you need to know kings & queens of England, state capitals of the USA, the highest mountains in each continent and the 4 home countries, ditto largest lakes. Add in a few Oscar winners, Authors of classic novels and you're off to a good start.

I think 'lack' of common sense is really a reflection of changing reading habits.

When I was growing up, if you were interested in any topic in the news you picked up a newspaper. And then you read it from cover to cover and picked up tons and tons of other stuff along the way.

Now you just google your topic. you might be reading from the same source, but you are literally only reading about stuff you care about. General knowledge is the opposite of that - the accumulation of knowledge that you don't actually give AF about.

My DH’s favourite TV programme is University Challenge. He’s banned from playing Trivial Pursuits.