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posted by mrpg on Wednesday October 24 2018, @09:07AM   Printer-friendly
from the don't-care-I'm-getting-intelligenter dept.

Slate:

In November, the European TV channel Arte aired an hourlong documentary, Demain, tous crétins?—Tomorrow, everyone’s an idiot?—on a topic that would seem to be of great importance. It starts with a London-based researcher, Edward Dutton, who has documented decades-long declines in average IQs across several Western countries, including France and Germany. “We are becoming stupider,” announces Dutton at the program’s start. “This is happening. It’s not going to go away, and we have to try to think about what we’re going to do about it.”

[...] It’s wrong to hint that scores on tests of memory and abstract thinking have been falling everywhere, and in a simple way. But at least in certain countries—notably in Northern Europe—the IQ drops seem very real. Using data from Finland, for example, where men are almost always drafted into military service, whereupon they’re tested for intelligence, Dutton showed that scores began to slide in 1997, a trend that has continued ever since. Similar trends have been documented using data from Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. At some point in the mid-1990s, IQ scores in these countries tipped into decay, losing roughly one-fifth to one-quarter of a point per year. While there isn’t any sign of this effect on U.S. test results (a fact that surely bears on our indifference to the topic), researchers have found hints of something similar in Australia, France, Germany and the Netherlands.

Are we becoming dumber, as in losing cognitive function, or merely less-well read?


Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 5, Informative) by Oakenshield on Wednesday October 24 2018, @01:26PM (8 children)

    by Oakenshield (4900) on Wednesday October 24 2018, @01:26PM (#752943)

    Anecdotal evidence suggests the effect is true. For instance, I had this conversation not once, not twice, but three times in the same semester with three different grad students at my university:

    student: Can you install this software package in the XXX lab?
    me: It's already installed and it's current
    student: No it isn't. I just left that lab.
    me: Yes it is. Look in the start menu and there is an icon on the desktop.
    student: Sorry, but it's not. Can I install it?
    me: Let me show you. (Walks to lab) See? Right there on the desktop.
    student: Well it wasn't there earlier.
    me: Jesus...

    These are GRAD students. On the third go around, I just told number three to install it if it makes him feel better. The machines are deep frozen. There's hardly a day that goes by that I wonder how these kids made it through high school, let alone found their way to college. Around tax season, I find W-2 forms and tax returns left in the printers all the time. SMH

    Starting Score:    1  point
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  • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 24 2018, @01:36PM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 24 2018, @01:36PM (#752950)

    Are all your grad students called Jesus, [youtube.com] or just the truly exceptional ones?

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 24 2018, @03:18PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 24 2018, @03:18PM (#753017)

      Not all are called Jesus. Some are named Pablo or Miguel or even Consuela.

  • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 24 2018, @02:01PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 24 2018, @02:01PM (#752968)

    We've been having a strong economy for 10 years. Not so many people applying to spend seven years to push out having to make a decision on what they want to do.

  • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday October 24 2018, @07:01PM (4 children)

    by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday October 24 2018, @07:01PM (#753197) Journal

    That conversation was matched yesterday, at work. I wasn't present, so I got it second hand.

    Super: I want you to bolt this punch press to this steel table.

    Worker: weld . . . weld . . . weld . . . "I'm done!"

    Super: Did I tell you to weld, or to bolt, that punch press.

    Worker: Oh, a weld is MUCH STRONGER!

    Super: You can't make a good weld between cast iron and carbon steel UNLESS you use an oven to control the temperatures.

    Worker: If the weld doesn't hold, I'll fix it.

    Roughly two hours later

    Super: I need you to BOLT that punch press to the table. Your weld broke already.

    Worker: Alright . . . weld . . . weld . . . weld

    Super: WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!?!?!

    Worker: I'm fixing my weld.

    Super: You can't DO THAT!

    Worker: Yeah, I know, but look at the clock, I have to go home!

    about six hours later

    Super2: Maintenance, I need you to look at the punch press at machine 11. The weld is cracking, and the press moves around on the table.

    Maintenance: I'll get to it in a little bit.

    about four hours later

    Maintenance2nd: Super2 wanted me to look at the punch press at machine 11, but I just never got around to it. Can you do something with it?

    Maintenance3rd: Yeah - no problem - uhhhhh - WTF welded cast iron to a steel table?

    Maintenance2nd: name - he's such a dumb shit - I get tired of cleaning up behind him because he's too stupid or too lazy to do it right the first time.

    Maintenance3rd: drill drill drill - for almost two hours

    If the original worker had done what he was told, the drilling would have been done in ten minutes, using a magnetic drill. Can't set the mag drill on the same table occupied by a punch press, and a bunch of ragged welding, so Maintenance3rd is using a hand drill to drill through 3/8 plate.

    • (Score: 2) by coolgopher on Thursday October 25 2018, @12:19AM (1 child)

      by coolgopher (1157) on Thursday October 25 2018, @12:19AM (#753404)

      Jesus...

      • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday October 25 2018, @12:37AM

        by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Thursday October 25 2018, @12:37AM (#753414) Journal

        Jesus hasn't worked here for about six years now.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 25 2018, @06:51AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 25 2018, @06:51AM (#753554)

      I would fire your ass so quick, Runaway. You are allegedly making decisions above your pay grade! Did you not learn about this in the Navy? Thinking you know more than those who know more than you results in Fox News, and General Quarters. Fraud. Now I know you do not know how to weld, and especially you do not know how to bolt. You're Fired, and not just from your job, but from SoylentNews, because we cannot have someone so ignorant being our public face, unless it is TMB, who also does not know how to weld, or bold. He can only hack.