Are people getting dumber?

[Anonymous]

Yes, open borders

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Throughout history people have been getting worse

I dont think so. People used to live shorter though so maybe they were just younger overall.

Wait so you’re saying the dumb ones used to get picked off via natural selection?

That makes sense to me.

[Anonymous]

Yes. It's the air freshener, dishwasher soap, dryer sheets etc. They swell the brain.

[Anonymous]

They never trained their brain to remember several things at the same time.They do one thing at the time and not in most efficient order. They also forget about what they did one minute after.
The ones arguing and listening to any suggestions, are the worse.
If I send them to third car from the left, they would go to third car from the right. If there are two tables numbered 4 and 5, they will definitely pick the wrong one after looking at the floor. It's like they reverse everything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They never trained their brain to remember several things at the same time.They do one thing at the time and not in most efficient order. They also forget about what they did one minute after.
The ones arguing and listening to any suggestions, are the worse.
If I send them to third car from the left, they would go to third car from the right. If there are two tables numbered 4 and 5, they will definitely pick the wrong one after looking at the floor. It's like they reverse everything.

This. The brain training is gone. And like OP, nobody freaking reads any longer. My workers don't read anything written up in their g-d tickets and are never embarrassed about being called out on it. Oh there's part three. Nobody's embarrassed or shamed. Dunce hat used to be a thing.

[Anonymous]

There used to be a large amount of respect and deference for those who were intelligent, but it’s turned into jealousy and anger. Being dumb isn’t something that people hide anymore.

[Anonymous]

Yes. I've been a high school English teacher for about 20 years. General reading comprehension skills have plummeted in the past decade, and analytical skills and ability to form ideas and question/discern between fact and opinion are almost gone.

I would say about half of my juniors and seniors are not capable of reading and understanding on the most basic level a novel the majority of students could read/understand in the first decade of my career. Even the best students are now using ChatGPT to quickly summarize articles, stories, and chapters, and don't kid yourself that they can easily revert to actually reading: those skils are gone. I teach at a high-tuition private school where most parents believe their children are brilliant.

I guess I'm getting old and cranky at 46, but I was recently looking over some essays written by kids I taught when I was 25, which were written in class in a timed format (AP Lit timed writing practice), and the difference between then and now is shocking.

It frightens me that we are losing the ability to access the written thoughts and ideas of our ancestors, and must now trust AI to summarize and present the material to us in a condensed bite with (one) interpretation. If I were an evil dictator in a dystopian novel, this is exactly where I would want my subjects to be: tractable because unable to think and analyze, wholly incapable of accessing alternative ideas in the form of surviving writing.

I don't know what the solution is, but I don't think the future is bright. If you could all see what I see, you would be very unsettled indeed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There used to be a large amount of respect and deference for those who were intelligent, but it’s turned into jealousy and anger. Being dumb isn’t something that people hide anymore.

Yes this, we used to worship intelligence, now we rather see trashy kardasians.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes. I've been a high school English teacher for about 20 years. General reading comprehension skills have plummeted in the past decade, and analytical skills and ability to form ideas and question/discern between fact and opinion are almost gone.

I would say about half of my juniors and seniors are not capable of reading and understanding on the most basic level a novel the majority of students could read/understand in the first decade of my career. Even the best students are now using ChatGPT to quickly summarize articles, stories, and chapters, and don't kid yourself that they can easily revert to actually reading: those skils are gone. I teach at a high-tuition private school where most parents believe their children are brilliant.

I guess I'm getting old and cranky at 46, but I was recently looking over some essays written by kids I taught when I was 25, which were written in class in a timed format (AP Lit timed writing practice), and the difference between then and now is shocking.

It frightens me that we are losing the ability to access the written thoughts and ideas of our ancestors, and must now trust AI to summarize and present the material to us in a condensed bite with (one) interpretation. If I were an evil dictator in a dystopian novel, this is exactly where I would want my subjects to be: tractable because unable to think and analyze, wholly incapable of accessing alternative ideas in the form of surviving writing.

I don't know what the solution is, but I don't think the future is bright. If you could all see what I see, you would be very unsettled indeed.

beautifully stated.

[Anonymous]

Absolutely they are.

[Anonymous]

Yes. MAGA is a cult. They’re brainwashed and lost all critical thinking skills. They are America’s worst citizens. They give nothing to America but headaches.

[Anonymous]

I like what the English teacher above wrote, as an example.

i think a few things are to blame - "leave no child behind" type educational policies which dumbed everythiing down to a bare minimum

also medications - the number of kids and moms expecting kids who are on SSRI's and similar is HUGE

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes. MAGA is a cult. They’re brainwashed and lost all critical thinking skills. They are America’s worst citizens. They give nothing to America but headaches.

And even worse, people like this posters believes stupidity falls along a political line in the sand.

[Anonymous]

You all are dumb. No people are not getting dumber. The way brains are being used has dramatically changed in the last 15 years. Some for the worse.

People have been dumb for all of human history. I mean, look back on the 1960s and Vietnam War. Idiot americans lost all ability to reason about that war, and had the audacity to to shut down any criticism of the US at the time -- criticism which was entirely legitimate and turned out to be 100% true, with the passage of time. But like 95% of Americans were so laser focused on their own echo chamber that they wouldn't engage in any meaningful debate about it. I cite that example just because it's recent and so glaring a case of black/white right/wrong answers, but there are tons of examples in history of idiots.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They never trained their brain to remember several things at the same time.They do one thing at the time and not in most efficient order. They also forget about what they did one minute after.
The ones arguing and listening to any suggestions, are the worse.
If I send them to third car from the left, they would go to third car from the right. If there are two tables numbered 4 and 5, they will definitely pick the wrong one after looking at the floor. It's like they reverse everything.

It's hard to focus when I am "microdosing."