ARRRRRRRG!

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Honest to fuck question:

Is the human race becoming collectively smarter or dumber?

Given that the sum of all knowledge, rapidly becoming universally available is a factor in all of this, like I'm getting that the smart primates these days are capable of a much higher level of smart than their predecessors in a way that's not inversely prevalent in the ones dragging the averages down the way - they aint capable of any greater feats of dumb, beyond population growth.

Collectively dumber, and collectively more civilized.  The two are linked.

Primitive societies, after all, select for intelligence.

Urbanized societies select for disease resistance.

Therefore, with less selection for intelligence, genetic load is created, as dumb people are allowed to survive and propagate.

There is no ethical means to escape this dilemma.

The average IQ has been steadily and significantly on the rise in the US for the last 60 years. It's called the Flynn Effect and no one's entirely sure why it's happening, although there are several theories. It's also occurring in other parts of the world, to varying degrees.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Honest to fuck question:

Is the human race becoming collectively smarter or dumber?

Given that the sum of all knowledge, rapidly becoming universally available is a factor in all of this, like I'm getting that the smart primates these days are capable of a much higher level of smart than their predecessors in a way that's not inversely prevalent in the ones dragging the averages down the way - they aint capable of any greater feats of dumb, beyond population growth.

Collectively dumber, and collectively more civilized.  The two are linked.

Primitive societies, after all, select for intelligence.

Urbanized societies select for disease resistance.

Therefore, with less selection for intelligence, genetic load is created, as dumb people are allowed to survive and propagate.

There is no ethical means to escape this dilemma.

The average IQ has been steadily and significantly on the rise in the US for the last 60 years. It's called the Flynn Effect and no one's entirely sure why it's happening, although there are several theories. It's also occurring in other parts of the world, to varying degrees.

Doesn't seem possible, but I'm wrong about all kinds of shit.  I shall have to read up on this...

HOWEVER:  Is IQ a measurement of intelligence or not?  I can't keep up.

[LMNO]

Ok, a small spark happened in my head.  I gotta lotta shit to do, so fractured sentences.

Constitution was written with 13 states and 2.5M people.  Land mass went as far west as Mississippi river.

Worked pretty well.

US now 300M+, 50 states, and a land mass more than twice original size.

Not working well.

Solution: Break up North America into four new countries.

or

Group country into four states, and those states have principalities with the same shape as the current US states.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

HOOOOKay, SO:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flynn_effect

The Flynn effect is the substantial and long-sustained increase in intelligence test scores measured in many parts of the world from roughly 1930 to the present day. When intelligence quotient (IQ) tests are initially standardized using a sample of test-takers, by convention the average of the test results is set to 100 and their standard deviation is set to 15 or 16 IQ points. When IQ tests are revised, they are again standardized using a new sample of test-takers, usually born more recently than the first. Again, the average result is set to 100. However, when the new test subjects take the older tests, in almost every case their average scores are significantly above 100.

Does this mean that people are culturally more standardized, or that they're getting smarter?

As for the rest of the world, it's even happening in Scotland:

Test score increases have been continuous and approximately linear from the earliest years of testing to the present. For the Raven's Progressive Matrices test, subjects born over a 100 year period were compared in Des Moines, Iowa, and separately in Dumfries, Scotland. Improvements were remarkably consistent across the whole period, in both countries.[1] This effect of an apparent increase in IQ has also been observed in various other parts of the world, though the rates of increase vary.[2]

Also:

Ulric Neisser estimates that using the IQ values of today the average IQ of the U.S. in 1932, according to the first Stanford–Binet Intelligence Scales standardization sample, was 80. Neisser states that "Hardly any of them would have scored 'very superior,' but nearly one-quarter would have appeared to be 'deficient.'" He also writes that "Test scores are certainly going up all over the world, but whether intelligence itself has risen remains controversial."

So, humans are smarter, or...?

And then THIS fucks up all my hypothesis:

There is debate about whether the rise in IQ scores also corresponds to a rise in intelligence, or a rise in skills related to taking IQ tests. Because children attend school longer now and have become much more familiar with the testing of school-related material, one might expect the greatest gains to occur on such school content-related tests as vocabulary, arithmetic or general information. Just the opposite is the case: abilities such as these have experienced relatively small gains and even occasional decreases over the years. The greatest Flynn effects occur instead for tests that measure latent factors. For example, Dutch conscripts gained 21 points during only 30 years, or 7 points per decade, between 1952 and 1982.[9] But this rise in IQ test scores is not wholly explained by an increase in general intelligence. Studies have shown that while test scores have improved over time, the improvement is not fully correlated with latent factors related to intelligence.[13] Rushton asserts that the "gains in IQ over time (the Lynn-Flynn effect) are unrelated to g".[8][14] Researchers have shown that the IQ gains described by the Flynn effect are due in part to increasing intelligence, and in part to increases in test-specific skills.

So, yeah, this seems to be a thing.

Which indicates that the anthropologists might be wrong about which environments select for what.

Or there's a connection that is not being seen, which allows both to be true.

[Junkenstein]

I personally think IQ tests and the like are a heap of shit designed to give some a special feeling and little else.

I'm fairly sure there are some that can effectively arbirtarilay rate intelligence in certain areas. Unfortunately the tests are rarely designed to test multiple different kinds of intelligence.

I would suspect that the overall level of human intelligence rising has a lot to do with literacy rates in developing countries. If I recall correctly that was the one biggest factors in developing nations. The others being Water and food.

This is probably where I realise I should have read the thread and not the last couple of posts. Ah well.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Solution: Break up North America into four new countries.

This is probably the only solution, but I can't see it happening without catastrophic and very immediate conflict.

[LMNO]

Yeah, I knew I was dreaming when I wrote this, so forgive me if it goes astray... But when I woke up this morning, I coulda sworn it was judgment day.  The sky was all purple, there were people running everywhere. Trying to run from the destruction, but you know I didn't even care.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Yeah, I knew I was dreaming when I wrote this, so forgive me if it goes astray... But when I woke up this morning, I coulda sworn it was judgment day.  The sky was all purple, there were people running everywhere. Trying to run from the destruction, but you know I didn't even care.

That's kinda the point.  Brain-damaged brain-storming.

And you got our yesterday.  The sun was a pale disc in the sky, as the sandstorm blotted out the world.  The sky was baby-shit yellow, and we didn't even have Prince to save us.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I personally think IQ tests and the like are a heap of shit designed to give some a special feeling and little else.

I'm fairly sure there are some that can effectively arbirtarilay rate intelligence in certain areas. Unfortunately the tests are rarely designed to test multiple different kinds of intelligence.

I would suspect that the overall level of human intelligence rising has a lot to do with literacy rates in developing countries. If I recall correctly that was the one biggest factors in developing nations. The others being Water and food.

This is probably where I realise I should have read the thread and not the last couple of posts. Ah well.

They fairly accurately measure a somewhat arbitrary type of logic that is useful for solving certain types of puzzles.

It's not a global measure, so rising literacy rates in developing countries are not effecting it. You should read about it, it's quite interesting and has been studied fairly extensively.

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

Ok, a small spark happened in my head.  I gotta lotta shit to do, so fractured sentences.

Constitution was written with 13 states and 2.5M people.  Land mass went as far west as Mississippi river.

Worked pretty well.

US now 300M+, 50 states, and a land mass more than twice original size.

Not working well.

Solution: Break up North America into four new countries.

or

Group country into four states, and those states have principalities with the same shape as the current US states.

When I was working on a scifi book a while back this was part of the back story. New England has very little in common with Arizona, and while I'm sure we could be perfectly cordial neighbors, I don't think living in the same house is working out.

[tyrannosaurus vex]

Ok, a small spark happened in my head.  I gotta lotta shit to do, so fractured sentences.

Constitution was written with 13 states and 2.5M people.  Land mass went as far west as Mississippi river.

Worked pretty well.

US now 300M+, 50 states, and a land mass more than twice original size.

Not working well.

Solution: Break up North America into four new countries.

or

Group country into four states, and those states have principalities with the same shape as the current US states.

When I was working on a scifi book a while back this was part of the back story. New England has very little in common with Arizona, and while I'm sure we could be perfectly cordial neighbors, I don't think living in the same house is working out.

Fuck that! Living in the same house with New England is the only thing that stops my state from completely diving into the shallow end of an empty pool.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Ok, a small spark happened in my head.  I gotta lotta shit to do, so fractured sentences.

Constitution was written with 13 states and 2.5M people.  Land mass went as far west as Mississippi river.

Worked pretty well.

US now 300M+, 50 states, and a land mass more than twice original size.

Not working well.

Solution: Break up North America into four new countries.

or

Group country into four states, and those states have principalities with the same shape as the current US states.

When I was working on a scifi book a while back this was part of the back story. New England has very little in common with Arizona, and while I'm sure we could be perfectly cordial neighbors, I don't think living in the same house is working out.

dont leave me alone with these people

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

Ok, a small spark happened in my head.  I gotta lotta shit to do, so fractured sentences.

Constitution was written with 13 states and 2.5M people.  Land mass went as far west as Mississippi river.

Worked pretty well.

US now 300M+, 50 states, and a land mass more than twice original size.

Not working well.

Solution: Break up North America into four new countries.

or

Group country into four states, and those states have principalities with the same shape as the current US states.

When I was working on a scifi book a while back this was part of the back story. New England has very little in common with Arizona, and while I'm sure we could be perfectly cordial neighbors, I don't think living in the same house is working out.

Fuck that! Living in the same house with New England is the only thing that stops my state from completely diving into the shallow end of an empty pool.

MAYBE IF YOU DIDN'T LISTEN TO EXPERIMENTAL BEEP-BOOP ALL DAY WE'D STICK AROUND.

[Luna]

Ok, a small spark happened in my head.  I gotta lotta shit to do, so fractured sentences.

Constitution was written with 13 states and 2.5M people.  Land mass went as far west as Mississippi river.

Worked pretty well.

US now 300M+, 50 states, and a land mass more than twice original size.

Not working well.

Solution: Break up North America into four new countries.

or

Group country into four states, and those states have principalities with the same shape as the current US states.

When I was working on a scifi book a while back this was part of the back story. New England has very little in common with Arizona, and while I'm sure we could be perfectly cordial neighbors, I don't think living in the same house is working out.

dont leave me alone with these people

You could escape (you KNOW we'd put up barbed wire and shit, first thing, right?) and come live up here, if you weren't afraid of all the nature we let run loose up here.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Ok, a small spark happened in my head.  I gotta lotta shit to do, so fractured sentences.

Constitution was written with 13 states and 2.5M people.  Land mass went as far west as Mississippi river.

Worked pretty well.

US now 300M+, 50 states, and a land mass more than twice original size.

Not working well.

Solution: Break up North America into four new countries.

or

Group country into four states, and those states have principalities with the same shape as the current US states.

When I was working on a scifi book a while back this was part of the back story. New England has very little in common with Arizona, and while I'm sure we could be perfectly cordial neighbors, I don't think living in the same house is working out.

dont leave me alone with these people

You could escape (you KNOW we'd put up barbed wire and shit, first thing, right?) and come live up here, if you weren't afraid of all the nature we let run loose up here.

Gravity is too high.  We are all pinned to the desert floor, helplessly shitting ourselves.

No, scratch that.  We all love it here, and we'd never leave.  SEE, MAMA TUCSON!  WE LOVE YOU!  WE'RE DANCING JUST AS FAST AS WE CAN!