Are We Getting Dumber?
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 8 ก.พ. 2025
- Research shows that IQs have been declining since the 1990s. In addition, our industrialised societies have replaced expertise and skill by machine production and mass consumption. In this way, as a society, we are constantly losing skills and becoming less and less able to do the things that previous generations were able to.
#philosophy #rational #ai #artificialintelligence #society #skills #capitalism #industrialization #culture
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I'm just about to graduate from university (double degree in physics and anthropology), and Im glad i got my education now and not later. This year a lot of the specialty courses in both disciples were cut in favor of a smaller curriculum only focusing on "required" subjects. This meant cutting classes like general relativity, advanced atrophysics, and anthropology special studies. It was a decision that came from the highest levels in the university and none of the students or faculty were happy about it.
That sounds terrible!
Especially in the current environment, where most information young people are viewing comes mainly from unregulated and often anonymous sources, containing all kinds of factual inaccuracies, sometimes intentionally.
I don't think people appreciate how fragile civilization is. When a society rejects reality, it's on an unsustainable path.
Thank you for this reflection and video.. As a lecturer myself I've observed many young people showing lack of sensitivity or appreciation for the great people/thoughts/things of the time they're not in.. mentions of the likes of Tolstoy, Bach, Kllimt..they seem to hit the walls around them and bounce back. Traveling - visiting places, like many other things, is now done more for the sake of the idea of doing it than to do it out of the sheer want or love for it. And the sum of all this is reflected in the kinds of literature, music, movies, inventions, debates we've seen in the last couple of decades.
Sounds like ranting, all this.. but the concerns are not out of place or exaggerated either.
Loved the absence of music or sounds in your video by the way. Thanks again for your effort and thoughts.
Thank you so much for that! About the music, it's funny because I actually intended to add sound effects and music, but we were on the way to catch a plane for the holidays two days ago and I could just managed to finish the upload before the taxi came to get us to the airport. That's the reason the video does not have any sound effects :) I was feeling bad about it, to put up such a raw and unfinished video, and so I'm particularly pleased that your comment now makes me look like a considerate creator rather than what I am, a hack who was too slow to get his video done in time. But I'll keep this in mind for the future and perhaps cut down on the sounds and music generally. I always thought that they improved the emotional experience and the immersion of the viewer in the video, although I know that they can be troublesome for people with hearing difficulties.
About the young people problem, I'm always reluctant to blame them. They really don't have a choice - it's society that raises them in this way, their parents, schools, media -- and these are the things that *we*, the older generations, are supposed to control. I always feel that it's my generation that got things wrong. It was us who developed the Internet as it is now, it was us who ignored climate change and microplastics for decades, it was us who allowed this rampant capitalism to take over... and so on. The question is now, how to fix all that?
@@dailyphilosophy Contrary to what's said in the other comment, I find your way of presenting and speech very clear. But guess that differs from person to person. The lack of sound effects or score makes the whole thing more genuine.. like say the Star Talk channel.. podcast-like.. but you'll know better..
Love your optimism and kindness on the young people issue. I'm an 86-born and the social/behavioural changes I've observed are to me rather sudden and drastic, and guess hence the lack of optimism. But maybe I'll have a better understanding in time..
@@dailyphilosophy I'll blame media, though I guess it's really the brain itself that is at fault. Growing up in the 90's, as a kid, I didn't really watch a lot of kids shows, I loved watching Discovery channel and Animal Planet. They used to do a lot of interesting documentaries from around the world, how things were done among tribal farmers who moved around every year and a lot more.
In the 8th grade, we had a verbal test that I hadn't studied for, specifically about tribes, including tribal farmers that move around each year. I got a 4 (out of 6) without reading anything about the topic in school, just from watching Discovery channel and Animal Planet.
That said, the format I grew up with isn't "entertaining" enough, people would rather watch quick and funny stuff, it does after all feel good to laugh. There is not enough money in educational content anymore, and why would the media houses invest in quality content that no one watches? Even with interesting areas (such as the mesoamerican pyramids) there's usually some quest to verify some conspiracy theory or a myth, or for good measure, make it about aliens...
Predictable profit decides where media invests their money, and our brains enjoy chemicals that make us feel good quickly.
@@dailyphilosophy
A lot of information and well presented, being clear and easy to follow.
I agree with @harshjoshi1364 about the lack of music and sound effects. Although it's not how you wanted to present the video, I found it works very well. With no such distractions, my mind can easily focus not only on what you're saying but also my own thoughts and experiences, simultaneously. It really helps to focus on the subject (without the emotions). I think we automatically lose a few IQ points whenever our emotions kick in and the stronger the emotion, the more points we lose.
Please keep up the good work!
The men you mention are white. And because the world is getting dumber i have to explain that TPTB are trying to annihilate "white" anything. This is the sole reason you dont hear from smart folks anymore and if you do its most likely negative info.
Great video again 👍
@@PixPunxel Great comment again! 👍
@@dailyphilosophy Hehe. Sorry it was low effort. But I think you said all that was needed to be said 😄
In my experience 30s, people are smarter than ever, we’re just more diverse with our interests. I no way is memorizing Ancient Greek important to survival, and mastering space time to escape the heat death of the universe. I’m more focused on saving humans and making us a multiversal species. Let’s invent time machines first, then living in that Greek era would do way more for your Greek than studying it in the current era
What I took away was look at what those people in the past could make or grow. But those people worked from before sunrise till sunset at least six days a week until they couldn't and they died how many people now even work overtime and are our lives so bad off. IQ score isn't everything especially if you aren't happy.
We certainly have more free time, but are our lives happier overall? We mostly kill that free time watching TV or consuming social media, which does not make us happier or more fulfilled. In older times they did not have as much "free" time, but much of their "working" time was filled with meaningful, creative work, similar to what we would do today in a crafts class. Perhaps one doesn't need so much free time if one's time is filled with meaningful activity.
Do you think if we got rid of grading, students would be more engaged to the concept of writing something meaningful to the subject ? I guess it would only work if they were somewhat passionate about it. How do you make the subject more exciting?
I think that this is a very difficult question to answer. Studies seem to support that intrinsic motivation, that is, working to solve a problem rather than to get a grade, is better for learning. But I don't think that one lecturer or teacher can do that alone, if the rest of the young people's lives are lived chasing grades (or other similar tokens of social approval). One cannot fight this system alone. If a whole school decided to abolish grades (or at least reduce their weight) or if a university tried to emphasise self-motivated learning instead of teaching to the exam, then perhaps it might work. There are some institutions (Montessori schools or the old Summerhill experiment come to mind) which have tried this. Depending on how you evaluate the results, some people see them as successful, others as failures. The problem is that after school, these same people will go on to work in competitive job markets, where again they will be subject to numerical performance evaluations, only now they will be unprepared to succeed in those. Perhaps the creator economy might offer a way out of this competitive school-workplace cage life? It's also competitive, but at least it focuses on actual productivity and results rather than empty performance numbers. Who knows.
Thank you for your comment!
If we got rid of grades, we'd leave learning to the own kid's choice. And we all know what choices children make. Let them chose between ice cream and math homework, you already know what's gonna happen. Humans are not born civilized, curious and edcuated. No grading would simply accelerate the intelligence decline.
You are right about passion. And that's precisely why the no-grades idea doesn't work. Passion in some sense is an ability you aquire. You can only passionate about subjects you've already built some competence around. In order to gain such competence, you need to go through boring, mundane studying no one wants. How do you make kids go through such boring tasks? You punish or reward them with grades. No grades, no competence, no passion.
With respect to Montessori schools: In my experience they fail. Anytime I have met someone from Montessori, they joke about how they don't do learn anything in those schools, how it's a complete joke. I had classmates, who had come to us from Montessori. They said it's completely different. They actually were somewhat happy that now, attending a normal school, they could learn something.
I've heard similar stories. But it's sad, isn't it, that we need to be forced with grades and threats to learn. The basic idea of Montessori was that children are naturally curious and eager to learn. Is this wrong, or is it that today's children in particular have lost their natural curiosity, perhaps due to the overuse of smartphones, computer games etc?
@@dailyphilosophy I think if the knowledge that was allowed was meaningful and productive no matter the subject matter could be beneficial to learn. SOMEONE has to study ice cream, otherwise you wouldn’t have good ice cream. SOMEONE has to study math, because we need math in life.
I enjoyed going to a Montessori school for my 6th grade year, being able to use your own time to get the work done was great. We still had lectures, but we were allowed to go at our own pace and if we needed help we could ask.
I would love an educational system where all world knowledge is available to students, like what we see on TH-cam. You might think learning about “how ants farm fungus” or “how to weave a 15th century basket” is useless information, but I happen to think otherwise. Knowledge comes from different perspectives, you gotta look or experiment outside the box to evolve.
Definitely still required to learn basics, and definitely still required to practice writing. But I think learning other “useless” information should be okay too. As long as they’re spending their time productively learning. Teach cooking, cleaning, how to use tools, how to budget, taking care of plants and animals, childcare, etc. If the student wants to specialize in something they like, then give them ALL the resources. Let them learn as much as they can..
But I digress, I love to learn.. some people dont. Some people do need that extra push, but if the push is towards their special interests you’ll find that it’s easier to push.
The great solar flare that will fry all the electronics on earth is humanity's only hope.
Joke aside, I've already been trying to learn to do things myself, not because I can't afford those things, but because consumer goods are often low quality.
But I too am addicted to my smartphone. In my case, i tend to use the internet as a distraction to manage stress. It's only my personal observation, but the previous generation seems to be better able to manage stress than me.
Is a lowered ability to manage chronic stress also a possible factor to explain the drop in IQ and motivation ?
I haven't done any research, but i've seen a video about the drop of testosterone levels in men. Maybe there is a link. If I had the motivation, I'd read some papers and learn something. Maybe some day :)
By the way, this video wouldn't have been better had you used a narrator. Your face and your voice is also relevant information. I like seeing and hearing the actual human behind the thoughts, it makes more sense.
I wonder if the problem with managing stress today has to do with the fact that we don't have any stress-free times in our lives any more. When I grew up, there were no phones, no Internet, and TV had two channels. When there wasn't anything to do, one just did... nothing. As kids, we spent endless time daydreaming, looking out the window, playing with other kids, or reading. In my late middle age, I can still spend an afternoon happily doing nothing at all, just sitting on a sofa and looking out a window. I suspecting that people who grow up with smartphones and social media never have this stress-free experience of empty, relaxing time. Social media are inherently stressful, engaging the viewer in constant scrolling and engagement, in the constant chase of confirmation, likes etc. How can people whose whole lives, including their free time, are full of stress, learn to manage stress?
Nice video, but too much time taken up with IQ figures (with little attention to the problems with that measure)...
Learning ancient Greek or Latin are not definitive signs of intelligence.
I think you are over estimating previous students. People have always been dumb, AI just makes it easier to get away with it.
Writing a business letter is not a skill. Majority of output from academia in the last 50 years could come from AI (may have less spelling and grammar mistakes and make more sense if so). Because business letters and mediocre academic papers have no value. 😢
Writing something which makes real sense is a skill which cannot easily be replaced by AI. In the same way, it will take a while for AI to be able to tell the difference between trash and value.
That is our task, not worrying about what has been lost, or what has changed.
Interesting subject and well researched, but please let someone else do the talking. I would rather listen to nails on a chalkboard than hear you speak. It's way too slow, you have a pretty heavy accent and you use very akward breaks in your speech.
Hi, and thank you for your comment! I really appreciate it when comments are honest and point out real issues with the videos. Unfortunately, the problem is not easy to solve. First, it's difficult to find "someone else to do the talking." Who would do this? Should I pay a presenter? This I cannot do, as all my videos currently bring in less than 10 USD each month, together. And my friends and family are, naturally, the same kind of foreigner that I am, so there are no native English speakers among them either. I could use AI, I guess, but then it would have to be a faceless video with AI narration, and this would be an entirely different thing, and TH-cam is already swamped with those. Despite my bad delivery, I believe that there is a value in connecting in person with a creator, and I would not want to give that up and replace it with AI. That said, I am constantly trying to improve, particularly in the areas you mentioned. I'm already recording endless takes of the same sentence to get the intonation sound as natural as possible and the pauses removed. I've recently changed microphones to improve the quality of the recording itself. And I think I'm improving somewhat over time, although there is still a long way to go. I'm also trying to improve (reduce) my accent, but since I'm now almost sixty, it takes time to change one's speech patterns. So I don't really see what I could do to solve the problem immediately, without going the AI route. I'll keep practicing and hope that eventually my videos will be less painful to listen to. Thanks!
@@dailyphilosophy personally i find the slower pace of the videos refreshing. Content is getting too fast, too focused on getting our attention just for the sake of it. Also i love the politeness and comprehensiveness of the answer to a rather rude comment.
As for the original commenter, maybe look inwards and try to improve your "foreign accent understanding" skills, man's speaking as clearly as he is coherently
@@dailyphilosophy Dr. Matthias, I hope you don't let some of the comments discourage you. The value is in the content and, in any event, your accent isn't really hard to understand. I only found your channel today - partly because I've started reading some philosophy (in my late 70s). It would be impossible to appeal to everyone in a space as large as TH-cam. My own feedback is that you are putting out interesting, timely and thought provoking videos. Please keep going. Subscribing now.