Scientific Literacy? Politicians Make Embarrassing Gaffes About Science, Technology (PHOTOS)

Missouri Rep. Todd Akin took a lot of heat last month for his remark in a television interview suggesting that women can't get pregnant from being raped.

“It seems to be, first of all, from what I understand from doctors, it’s really rare," Akin said in the interview. "If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut the whole thing down."

But in fact, women can become pregnant from rape as well as consensual sex--an estimated 32,101 pregnancies result from rape each year in the U.S., according to a study from the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston.

Yet, Akin is not the only politician to have made such a massive science gaffe. From "the Internets" to fruit fly research, check out the slideshow below to see other politicians' notorious science flubs.

Correction: An earlier version of this article included a reported quote from Palin regarding dinosaurs, which has been removed.