Idiocracy is a documentary?

[SamBridge]

I didn't think the movie would be too accurate, but apparently http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/researchers-western-iqs-dropped-14-points-over-last-180634194.html

That means this forum is in trouble!

Just as a personal oddity, I have more than twice the reaction time of an average person (which I measured in a physics experiment with three different senses), but it takes me twice as long to do moderately complex arithmetic problems even though I practice it in all sorts of calculus problems I do involving expanding or shrinking polynomials, how accurate is this exactly? There has to be different components of what is called "intelligence".

Edited May 25, 2013 by SamBridge

[krash661]

i have always said humanity is heading in one of two directions,

 

terminator

or

idiocracy.

[SamBridge]

i have always said humanity is heading in one of two directions,

 

terminator

or

idiocracy.

Or the third option that's way more realistic, firefly. At first glance it doesn't seem like a decrease in IQ to below 100 in the entire Earth population could happen in a short span of 500 years, especially considering the smart people you would need to repair new technology and invent new technology, but I guess it is 14 points over 100 years, perhaps it will either level off or keep going.

Edited May 25, 2013 by SamBridge

[EdEarl]

IMO

 

Our fast food, processed food, and lack of exercise has made us less healthy than our recent ancestors, as evinced by epidemics of diabetes, heart disease, and obesity. In particular plaque within our veins, arteries, and capillaries reduces blood flow to all parts of our body, including our brain. Our brains consume up to 25% of the energy we eat, which is delivered via the blood. Reduced blood flow must reduce brain capability, and diabetes reduces the ability of cells to use glucose (energy), which also must affect brain capability.

 

The healthiest of us are just as smart as we were a hundred years ago and before. Improve diet to improve brain function, especially eliminate cholesterol from your diet.

[SamBridge]

Yeah, forgot that food can have a bit of an impact as well. It seems just thinking about it that rural populations that get fresh foods do not have this deficiency in intelligence.

[krash661]

also,

how well built you are genetically matters.

[overtone]

The Flynn Effect, which is thoroughly documented, seems to contradict any assumption of a lowering of IQ levels. http://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Flynn_effect.html

 

The extrapolation of IQ to "intelligence" is problematical, of course.

 

But so is the extrapolation of visual reaction time to intelligence.

 

We live in sedentary times, with many possible reasons for a slowing of physically based reactions of all kinds, including visual.

 

The sport of baseball has long been acquainted with a disconnection between the ability to hit a fastball and "intelligence" - visual reaction is right at the center of hitting a fastball.

[SamBridge]

The Flynn Effect, which is thoroughly documented, seems to contradict any assumption of a lowering of IQ levels. http://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Flynn_effect.html

 

The extrapolation of IQ to "intelligence" is problematical, of course.

 

But so is the extrapolation of visual reaction time to intelligence.

 

We live in sedentary times, with many possible reasons for a slowing of physically based reactions of all kinds, including visual.

 

The sport of baseball has long been acquainted with a disconnection between the ability to hit a fastball and "intelligence" - visual reaction is right at the center of hitting a fastball.

As it was stated before, it is possible that the physical potential for human intelligence has not changed, factors that the study I posted failed to consider were diet, exercise as well as exposure to sunlight, psychiatric disorders like sleep disorders caused by an increasingly electronic society, depression which lowers neurological development, shorter attention spans also fueled by modern society, and I could keep going. While it seems reaction time may not necessarily be a good indicator, it still has in fact been measured that the average IQ has decreased.

Edited May 28, 2013 by SamBridge

[overtone]

 

. While it seems reaction time may not necessarily be a good indicator,
it still has in fact been measured that the average IQ has decreased.

Accoridng to dozens of research followups to the original observation of the eponymous Flynn, median IQ scores have been increasing steadily (the effect has been verified at the resolution of one year, with no backsliding anywhere even in war zones) for the better part of the past century.

 

The boost has been significant enough to require recalibration of the standard IQ tests every couple of years, to keep the scores comparable (100 at the center).

 

What happened to that well-established pattern?

[SamBridge]

Accoridng to dozens of research followups to the original observation of the eponymous Flynn, median IQ scores have been increasing steadily (the effect has been verified at the resolution of one year, with no backsliding anywhere even in war zones) for the better part of the past century.

 

The boost has been significant enough to require recalibration of the standard IQ tests every couple of years, to keep the scores comparable (100 at the center).

 

What happened to that well-established pattern?

The Flynn effect has to have it's limits as well, there is in fact an increasing trend in unhealthy foods in modern countries as well as a lack of exercise and intelligence cannot increase indefinitely at a constant rate, it would have to level off which is when negative factors could start taking a greater effect.

Edited May 28, 2013 by SamBridge

[John]

Yeah, the Flynn effect popped into my mind as well, though the Wikipedia article notes that, in developed nations at least, the effect seems to have leveled off and declines have been seen recently in a few instances: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flynn_effect#Possible_end_of_progression

 

It's all just natural selection in the end. We value high intelligence, but nature probably doesn't care one way or another.

Edited May 28, 2013 by John

[SamBridge]

It's all just natural selection in the end. We value high intelligence, but nature probably doesn't care one way or another.

At this point all it is, is ourselves. Intelligence definitely factors into natural selection anyway which is why we're here in the first place.

[overtone]

 

The Flynn effect has to have it's limits as well

Regardless, if we have a study that says IQ scores have been dropping since Victorian times, and we have another study that says IQ scores have been rising for more than a century now, one of those studies is wrong.

 

If the inference of IQ from visual reaction time is suspect (and I wonder about the measurement of visual reaction times in Victorian England), and the inference of intelligence from IQ is suspect, and no attention has been paid to things like childhood disease, child mortality patterns, heavy metal exposure, and physical exercise including basic walking around, what we have is a good opportunity to suspend judgment and avoid coming to conclusions.

[EdEarl]

IQ measurement was developed to predict the performance of students in school. There may be other kinds now, IDK, but I doubt they have one to measure how IQ affects ones chance to be selected by evolution, which seems to be a requirement to tell whether IQ has changed due to evolutionary causes in the recent past.

[SamBridge]

Regardless, if we have a study that says IQ scores have been dropping since Victorian times, and we have another study that says IQ scores have been rising for more than a century now, one of those studies is wrong.

As I said before, there are factors those studies failed to consider, such as diets, habits of exercise, sleep disorders, depression, diseases, ect, all of which effect the brain's ability to function. While the actual physical potential for IQ or intelligence has remained the same or increased, it seems more likely based on modern trends that there will be a decrease if there hasn't been on already that does not have to be largely related to genetics.

Edited May 28, 2013 by SamBridge