Common everyday language may be an obstacle as well as an asset in learning the concepts of physics. The intention of the work presented here is to find out to which degree municipal adult education students can describe some of the most common concepts in physics. Of the students in the survey approximately 50% have studied physics at upper secondary school level or higher. The result shows that studies in physics will remove some but not all of the misconceptions. By putting emphasis on the misconceptions in college or earlier the outcome could be improved. Some suggestions are made.