According to this report, Camelot have had to withdraw a scratch card because the general public are too thick to understand negative numbers.

From the article:

Tina Farrell, from Levenshulme, called Camelot after failing to win with several cards.

The 23-year-old, who said she had left school without a maths GCSE, said: “On one of my cards it said I had to find temperatures lower than -8. The numbers I uncovered were -6 and -7 so I thought I had won, and so did the woman in the shop. But when she scanned the card the machine said I hadn’t.

“I phoned Camelot and they fobbed me off with some story that -6 is higher – not lower – than -8 but I’m not having it.

Oh dear.

She even goes on to say:

“I think Camelot are giving people the wrong impression – the card doesn’t say to look for a colder or warmer temperature, it says to look for a higher or lower number.

Er… maybe I’m reading this wrong, but did she not just say: it said I had to find temperatures lower than -8 – does she really think that -6 is a lower temperature than -8?

And it sounds like she’s not the only one who struggled:

…the concept of comparing negative numbers proved too difficult for some Camelot received dozens of complaints on the first day from players who could not understand how, for example, -5 is higher than -6.

So, it would appear that the average IQ of the general public compares rather poorly with that of a slightly mouldy cabbage. Hardly a newsflash, but not nice to see it proved.