Would you rather have a free one-ounce gold coin, or $20 bucks? š¤¦š»āāļø pic.twitter.com/efvWzv54fz
ā Mark Dice (@MarkDice) October 19, 2023
Guest Post by The Zman
Dumb ideas are a feature of democracy. The main reason for this is the majority of people trusted with a vote are average or below average. Democracy works on the assumption that people work in series. Connect enough of them, no matter their intellectual capacity, and you get enough brain power. In reality, people work in parallel, so the more you connect, the faster dumb ideas flow through society. Democracy is the form of government with the lowest resistance to dumb ideas.
A new study, publishedĀ Monday by Norwegian researchers analyzed the IQ scores between 1962 and 1991 and found that scores increased by almost 3 percentage points each decade for those born between 1962 to 1975 – but then saw a steady decline among those born after 1975.
The earlier rise in IQ scores follows the so-called “Flynn effect” – a term for the long-term increase in intelligence levels that occurred during the 20th century, arguably the result of better access to education – according to Stuart Ritchie, a postdoctoral fellow in cognitive ageing at the University of Edinburgh whose research explores IQ scores and intelligence and who was not involved in the new study.