De-evolution

Thread Starter

maxpower097

Joined Feb 20, 2009
816
Don't take offense, obviously your an exception like lightfire but "I" find the latest generation just hopeless. Things you never would have scene in my day are daily norms. Kids shooting up schools, quality of public school systems suck, and I could go on and on. Its a real problem with this latest generation where all info is available immediately. Pretty much I'm just a believer too much technology can hurt our society, and were starting to see this with out latest generation. I'm also more so talking about he US because I don't live in EU.
 

Wendy

Joined Mar 24, 2008
23,415
Children are what we make them. I find many modern so called parenting techniques bogus, but the simple truth is you don't let your children watch inappropriate TV and movies, and you don't let children play inappropriate games. That and share your time with them, you should be the #1 influence in their lives.

When you talk about their failure you are talking about ours, not theirs.
 

strantor

Joined Oct 3, 2010
6,782
agreed bill, but that's part of the DEvolution. My generation (I'm 26) was largely raised by families with 2 working parents, and less influence from their parents than the historical norm. Less good examples = Less good people, and less fit parents. Now we are raising kids, and almost exclusively both parents work (if both parents are even in the picture) and even less influence on our kids. The influence that we do have on them (on average) will probably not be as good as the influence that our parents had on us, and assuredly much worse than our grandparents has on our parents. The kids are getting worse every generation.
 

Wendy

Joined Mar 24, 2008
23,415
When I talk Evolution I am talking about genetics. I don't think this is what you are talking about.

10 generations do not genetics make.
 

strantor

Joined Oct 3, 2010
6,782
There's different theories about intelligence, and whether it's a product of genetics or environment. There are outliers at both ends of the spectrum, but I think the majority subscribes to the idea that it's both, half/half. HALF of your intelligence is a big number; that's the difference between a genius (150IQ) and a near invalid (75IQ). And this half is directly related to the quality of one's upbringing. This half has devolved in < 3 generations.

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/famee.nr0.htm
"The labor force participation rate--the percent of the population working or looking for work--for all mothers with children under 18 was 70.8 percent in 2010"
 

Wendy

Joined Mar 24, 2008
23,415
Then we shall agree to disagree. Some people are born stupid, and some people don't like to think, but are not stupid. There is a difference.

Stupidity is terminal, Ignorance is curable. Another Heinlein quote.
 
Just thought I'd throw this in while we're on the subject of idiocy, and mass idiocy to be precise.

Today, in 2012, over vast swathes of sub-Saharan Africa, a full 95% of the population, including the "college educated" demographic, remain just as convinced as their forefathers were generations earlier, that is is physically possible to conjure nice crisp currency notes from the gaping skulls of ritual murder victims, thanks to the African "technology" of hocus pocus.

Thus, kidnapping for that specific grisly purpose, (but NOT for human organ harvest as is the case in the Middle East), continues on an industrial scale whose scope can only be imagined, since NO records or statistics on such disappearances have ever been kept.

Oddly enough, virtually ALL practitioners of such serial murders are ALSO rabidly religious was well, and regularly attend churches or mosques, in between doing what they do best.

Anyone who imagines I made all this up can be excused for holding a healthy scepticism, but this account is factual in every regard, sadly.
 

THE_RB

Joined Feb 11, 2008
5,438
When I talk Evolution I am talking about genetics. I don't think this is what you are talking about.

10 generations do not genetics make.
Actually 10 generations makes a big difference in genetics if there is a change of breeding patterns.

I'm always amazed watching WW1 and WW2 footage, people then had different shaped skulls, different ears etc. But in those days people would live in the same town they were born and marry in that same town. My dad who fought in WW2 said prior to the war possibly half the people in his home town had never even been to the neigbouring city, 20 miles away. Who wanted to take a horse trip 20 miles? And only rich people and businesses had cars in the 1930s.

After WW2 with the advent of jet airtravel humans have changed enormously!
 

Thread Starter

maxpower097

Joined Feb 20, 2009
816
Well theres a huge difference between a high IQ and being smart. Some of the guys I know with 150+ IQ's are basically socially handicapped. A high IQ just means you have a high ability to learn things, actually being smart would be high SAT's ACT's, etc..

About Bill saying its not genetics it totally is. If you have 10 generations of the dumbest people out of a group have kids. Your gonna have 99 idiots with one mutation with a high IQ. Just as if you took 10 generations of the smartest people out of 100 and bread them. You would have smarter kids. Think about it, if they can mutate animal colors in 10 generations, we could certainly breed idiots.
 

Sparky49

Joined Jul 16, 2011
833
Well, I would need to see a peer reviewed paper before I believe believing 'everyday, theoretical observations'.

Just like the sun...
 

justtrying

Joined Mar 9, 2011
439
I agree with Bill on one thing, there is a difference between actually being born with low mental capabilities and being born fully capable but choosing not to use your brain. I believe what is happening now is that most people are going for the visual stimulation and quick gratifying rewards therefore they choose to be "stupid". The bigger question is why...

a side note: I dislike the words stupid, smart, intelligent, IQ etc as they are all biased to some specific measure based on what was tested and how.
 

Thread Starter

maxpower097

Joined Feb 20, 2009
816
Another factor to bring in is our over education system. One headline that stands out in my mind is 2-3 years ago they said the FSU football team read at an average of a 2nd grade level. So with actual colleges getting easier/less secure? and with the flood of bogus and legit trade schools, is this making us dumber? I think so. Now a days people consider ITT, School for Art and Desgin, Everest, etc.. and all the other specialized trade schools as actual college. It makes me sick you can even get loans to goto these places. Sure some industries need trade schools, but I think the new modern ones are just jokes.
 

Adjuster

Joined Dec 26, 2010
2,148
Don't take offense, obviously your an exception like lightfire but "I" find the latest generation just hopeless. Things you never would have scene in my day are daily norms. Kids shooting up schools, quality of public school systems suck, and I could go on and on. Its a real problem with this latest generation where all info is available immediately. Pretty much I'm just a believer too much technology can hurt our society, and were starting to see this with out latest generation. I'm also more so talking about he US because I don't live in EU.
To write off an entire generation in this way is absurd. I cannot imagine how you think you have the measure of the whole condition of the US younger generation, let alone that of the world (which by the way comprises considerably more than just the US and the EU: where for instance is Asia in this?).

I think that what you are doing is to paint the whole of youth in the image of an underclass that you are familiar with, perhaps because these people have had a negative effect on your own circumstances.

We cannot deny that such groups exist, and it may be that in some societies they are becoming more prominent, but this blanket assumption that all youth is rubbish has to be opposed. Above all else, I fear that it may not be such a long step from entertaining such ideas of inferior groups to the taking of action of the kind which so blighted the middle of the last century.
 

Sparky49

Joined Jul 16, 2011
833
To write off an entire generation in this way is absurd. I cannot imagine how you think you have the measure of the whole condition of the US younger generation, let alone that of the world (which by the way comprises considerably more than just the US and the EU: where for instance is Asia in this?).

I think that what you are doing is to paint the whole of youth in the image of an underclass that you are familiar with, perhaps because these people have had a negative effect on your own circumstances.

We cannot deny that such groups exist, and it may be that in some societies they are becoming more prominent, but this blanket assumption that all youth is rubbish has to be opposed. Above all else, I fear that it may not be such a long step from entertaining such ideas of inferior groups to the taking of action of the kind which so blighted the middle of the last century.
Bravo that man.
 

Thread Starter

maxpower097

Joined Feb 20, 2009
816
Hey the facts are the facts. Asia's hard to gauge because you have so many highly educated people surrounded by millions of illiterate people. Since they essencially live in a split 1st world/ 3rd world country its hard to gauge their education levels. I'm not saying an entire generation is dumb and worthless. I'm just stating there is an obvious deterioration in our education and parenting over the past 20 years. Thats all I'm saying. Sure you have some younger kids that are really smart and went to private school and had a stable economic and family upbringing. But that is getting more rare by the second. And my final statement is, "You'll understand when you get a lil older"
 

Sparky49

Joined Jul 16, 2011
833
Really? You still haven't backed up any of these facts.

You plucked 'facts' seemingly out of the air, which really doesn't help your argument.

______________________

Also;

"I'm not saying an entire generation is dumb and worthless."

What about;

Its well known fact that this is the dumbest generation to have ever lived”
And
“but "I" find the latest generation just hopeless.”
 

justtrying

Joined Mar 9, 2011
439
http://www.news.com.au/why-bosses-hate-gen-y/story-0-1111114179056

This also supposed to describe me, but does not. like I said above, instant gratification is what people go for now. It will only get worse. Really, the discussion should be about moral and ethical stupidity as opposed to anything else... I can easily see how the upcoming generation will actually never grow out of their "adolescent" stage because of the way their development have been structured for them. If you like Justin Bieber at 5 years of age, who are you going to be? I view person's development not in terms of their intelligence, but in terms of how they interact with others. And in that sense, we are in the presence of great ignorance indeed.
 

Sparky49

Joined Jul 16, 2011
833
Half of that article praises "gen-y"...

Throughout most of recent history, New trends and fads have come and the older generations felt as if they were slipping into mayhem. A good example is of jazz music in the 20s and 30s. Some believed it would create raw, uncultured and uncivilised people, but we know that this is nonsense, and rather tame.

My bet is that it is happening today.

I guess we will only find out for certain in the next few years. If the world has melted down with the collapse of the dollar, superviruses, broken infrastructure and communications and we are plunged into another dark ages, then my hat will be off to you chaps.

If not... Well, I'll just have a wee smile. :)
 
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