Personally I think all exams should be on the curve.
Dave's 40% is a close approximation to the lowest acceptable mark that comes in the 'average' section. Average contains the 68% of the population that gets a mark between 'C+' and 'C-'
When I was an instructor in electronic communications a minimum pass for each exam within a phase was 40% but for the whole phase the pass mark was 50%. We also had a grading at 65% for the whole course, above which the student was judged fit to work independently and below 65% it was recommended they be supervised for a year or until their Station Engineer was satisfied with their performance. It should be noted that practical exams scored twice as much as theory exams, and the practical fault finding exams were time judged i.e. if you wanted an 'A' pass then you had to logically find the faulty pcb within 20 minutes, an hour was the maximum time to find the module in which the pcb was housed.

And to Gary's Doctors and Pilots.
Pilots are trained and examined for each aircraft type, where I assume a pass/fail is possibly judged a good enough criteria. But I'm not sure that is good enough or else there wouldn't have been some of the critical remarks about the 737Max crashes. Or maybe the recent Pakistan unqualified pilots scandal, where if I read it correctly the 'unqualified pilots' could take off and land if everything was as expected, but would fail when an unexpected situation popped up.

Doctors definitely on the curve, I would want a doctor who can diagnose the difference between pneumonia and covid-19 in a short time frame. A pass/fail system would probably only get a diagnosis of pneumonia and possibly the wrong treatment.

While for many professional exams they may give you a number like 70% they are not giving you a letter grade and it isn't really a curve. It is pass/fail. Some like the bar exam have fail rates of around 50%. Pilots generally aren't that bad as the teacher has to sign off that the student is ready to take the exam. However they are different, if you screw up any part of the practical you fail. For instance if you crash on landing no matter how good the rest of your test went, you don't get a license.

I'll post this here since SETI is down.

Doh! Not smarter than the average bear...

Huge ‘pong fest’ party exposes hundreds of teens to COVID-19 in Texas, officials say

While for many professional exams they may give you a number like 70% they are not giving you a letter grade and it isn't really a curve. It is pass/fail. Some like the bar exam have fail rates of around 50%. Pilots generally aren't that bad as the teacher has to sign off that the student is ready to take the exam. However they are different, if you screw up any part of the practical you fail. For instance if you crash on landing no matter how good the rest of your test went, you don't get a license.

I was going to suggest that an exception might be if something was wrong with the plane and the trainee pilot did well to get down safely if with a crash landing but I guess the examiner would have taken over.

I remember SARS and how it mutated into an air borne flu virus. The air borne flu virus from it was very much less harmful so lets hope that is the case with covid19.
Interestingly I find trails of research in virus interactivity with humans and other mammals.
When a female mammal including humans contract a virus when pregnant, the placenta doesn't provide immunity as the same as provided to the mother. In actual fact the virus is literally torn to pieces and can have traces of it found within the offspring commonly noted as not belonging there in the DNA. These components are manufactured by the offspring for its life's entirety. Could that mean gene pools do not die out due to alterations encouraged by virus? could virus be that missing clue to evolution of a species?

Totally hooked on Displates these days. Just ordered another 4 (with discount of 30%). These together with wall-art stickers are the invention of this decennial.
Now coming are two of Pink Floyd, one of a HEV station and one toilet sign.

Landed myself a new moderator job at Minecraft@Home. As a thank you for helping them out. LOL.

Grumble, my neighbor while mowing her lawn threw a rock breaking my bathroom window, grrrrrr.

Was she that angry?

She was very apologetic and offered to pay for it. Methinks the cost of replacing a tempered glass panel in a vinyl casement frame will surprise her.
I might let my home owners insurance deal with it.

The third wave has started in Hong Kong. We're still waiting for the second one.
People who've had corona aren't automatically immune for it, as new science has found that antibodies decline in as little as two months. It doesn't matter if you had a benign one or the full onslaught (and survived). That's going to be interesting for a vaccine, as we may have to get that every two months then.

The third wave has started in Hong Kong. We're still waiting for the second one.
People who've had corona aren't automatically immune for it, as new science has found that antibodies decline in as little as two months. It doesn't matter if you had a benign one or the full onslaught (and survived). That's going to be interesting for a vaccine, as we may have to get that every two months then.

Ooooh. I can see the vax police running around with dart guns darting everyone ... and different color ear tags based on what month you got darted ...</dystopia>

This is not going to end well for the world. The Spanish Flu, (February 1918 – April 1920), will look like a minor inconvenience when this pandemic is over.

People have become way too "me, me, my freedom, my freedom, I want, I want", for this to end well.

This is not going to end well for the world. The Spanish Flu, (February 1918 – April 1920), will look like a minor inconvenience when this pandemic is over.

People have become way too "me, me, my freedom, my freedom, I want, I want", for this to end well.

It could very well address global warming by reducing the human population by 10% and the climate contagion the specie is causing.

Fingers crossed for this: Human trials begin on coronavirus vaccine at the University of Queensland

new science has found that antibodies decline in as little as two months. It doesn't matter if you had a benign one or the full onslaught (and survived

A small sample size. (74 total) and in those who had symptoms, 13% antibodies had dropped to undetectable levels which means 87% they were still there to some extent. But still not good news.

And a local mystery: Mystery surrounds car with 'COVID 19' number plate parked at Adelaide Airport for months

new science has found that antibodies decline in as little as two months. It doesn't matter if you had a benign one or the full onslaught (and survived

A small sample size. (74 total) and in those who had symptoms, 13% antibodies had dropped to undetectable levels which means 87% they were still there to some extent. But still not good news.

New research in Belgium among 2,960 samples of people giving blood between 8 and 13 June 2020, showed 5.5% had antibodies. That's fewer than the 6.9% that was set at the end of May.

Restarted playing The Elderscrolls Online. The new chapter Greymoor is out. Which can be bought at standard version for $39.99 (or €39.99 which is $45.58) or the Collector's Edition for $54.99 (or €54.99 which is $62.68) (and yes, why do a 1 on 1 dollar to euro conversion? We're being ripped off!)
I didn't want to spend so much on the game and haven't and am glad I haven't. I paid a fairly reasonable €26,89 (or $30.65) for the collector's edition by getting a key from elsewhere (not Elsweyr). This map is smaller than many other DLC's to this game. I'm so glad I didn't fork out the full price. And have seen it could even be worse, as a Dutch retailer had it for €69,99 ($79.79) for the standard edition and a whopping €89,99 ($102,59) for the collector's edition.

Okay, so we're playing in Skyrim. Only the western part of that map.
I bought the house in Solitude, fully furnished and still can't put anything in a cupboard there. But it took me all of an hour to get make a full circle over this map. It takes a full hour to get out of the first mission in Skyrim! Doesn't bode well.

Of course you are being ripped off. The price has have VAT taken out, then taxes to ship out out of EU must be taken, then the money changer gets his fee and then there is the wire fee and finally it gets to a greenback bank.

Only half facetious.