Are people getting dumber? Research says "Yes"...

[kentuck]

<snip>
Our technology may be getting smarter, but a provocative new study suggests human intelligence is on the decline. In fact, it indicates that Westerners have lost 14 I.Q. points on average since the Victorian Era.

What exactly explains this decline? Study co-author Dr. Jan te Nijenhuis, professor of work and organizational psychology at the University of Amsterdam, points to the fact that women of high intelligence tend to have fewer children than do women of lower intelligence. This negative association between I.Q. and fertility has been demonstrated time and again in research over the last century.

.....

"The reduction in human intelligence (if there is any reduction) would have begun at the time that genetic selection became more relaxed," Dr. Gerald Crabtree, professor of pathology and developmental biology at Stanford University, told The Huffington Post in an email. "I projected this occurred as our ancestors began to live in more supportive high density societies (cities) and had access to a steady supply of food. Both of these might have resulted from the invention of agriculture, which occurred about 5,000 to 12,000 years ago."

As for Dr. te Nijenhuis and colleagues, they analyzed the results of 14 intelligence studies conducted between 1884 to 2004, including one by Sir Francis Galton, an English anthropologist and a cousin of Charles Darwin. Each study gauged participants' so-called visual reaction times -- how long it took them to press a button in response to seeing a stimulus. Reaction time reflects a person's mental processing speed, and so is considered an indication of general intelligence.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/22/people-getting-dumber-human-intelligence-victoria-era_n_3293846.html

[Jake Izzy]

1. If IQ tests had been reliable in the late 19th century, they would still be used today

Question #1) Are the same tests used today? If not, why not?

Question #2) Have scientists examined how reliable the late 19th century IQ tests were?

[geckosfeet]

4. The original IQ test had a lot more to do with surviving in the environment

than it did with answering a bunch of questions divorced from reality. If you lived and survived you probably had some smarts....

[notadmblnd]

2. Anyone that has seen the movie "Idiocracy" knows this

I wonder if these folks wrote the screen play?

[Bigmack]

3. That movie is a documentary...nt

[HughBeaumont]

7. An instruction manual . . .

[siligut]

5. More shades of William Shockley

And already posted. http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022885645

The uptick in "poor people and minorities are stupid" news is directly related to their failure to vote for republicans.

[lpbk2713]

6. Kinda looks that way doesn't it?

Just go to any GOP/Teabagger get together.