Slashdot Mirror


We're All Getting Dumber, Says Science (fastcompany.com)

dryriver shares a report from Fast Company: Researchers at Norway's Ragnar Frisch Center for Economic Research now have scientific proof of something we've long suspected -- we're all getting dumber. In their paper, "Flynn effect and its reversal are both environmentally caused," which was published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Bernt Bratsberg and Ole Rogeberg report that IQ scores have been steadily dropping since the 1970s.

The study consisted of analyzing 730,000 IQ test results gleaned from young men entering Norway's compulsory military service from 1970 to 2009. They found that scores declined by an average of seven points per generation, a reversal of the so-called "Flynn effect" where IQ was seen to be rising during the first part of the 20th century. The decline may be due to environmental factors, but because the researchers couldn't find consistent trends among families, Bratsberg and Rogeberg discounted factors like parental education, family size, increased immigration, and genetics as significant causes.

558 comments

  1. The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    .... sounds exactly like one of those results that would vanish in a puff of annoyingly-irreproducible logic if anyone actually tried to replicate the underlying studies.

    You know, like 90% of all other published research in the psychological sciences.

    1. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by ozduo · · Score: 1

      Want further proof look at the current offerings from Hollywood compared to 40 years ago. It's ao dumbed down today that their researchers must have come to the same conclusion.

      --
      I got to the chocolate box before you, that's why the hard ones have teeth marks.
    2. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Hognoxious · · Score: 2, Funny

      Is that the Errol Flynn effect?

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    3. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by Barsteward · · Score: 1

      They could have worked this out by just checking the voting patterns of a few countries of late

      --
      "The hands that help are better far than lips that pray." - Robert Ingersoll (1833-1899)
    4. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Or they could've just asked you? Since you know it all.

    5. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by GrumpySteen · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Ah yes, 40 years ago was a classic time in cinema. It's too bad we no longer get such intelligent fare as The Swarm, Laserblast and everyone's favorite The Star Wars holiday Special

      Or maybe... just maybe... you've forgotten that 99% of what was produced back them was garbage too, just like 99% of what's produced today.

    6. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      They could have worked this out by just checking the voting patterns of a few countries of late

      Not all people are stupid
       
      The Malaysian voters kicked out a 61 year old corrupt regime, on May 9th, 2018

    7. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If you honestly think Hollywood output would serve, in any way at all, as evidence of that maybe you should do some IQ tests yourself.

      The entertainment industry (you can include there music and others) is mostly about mindless fun. Mindless fun always were... well, mindless.

    8. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Exactly right sir. I get so annoyed when people say "back in the old days..." because the same effect applies on many levels.

      Old people today act like the USA is so much more violent and riddled with crime when in reality we have considerably less violence and crime.

      The vast majority of books, movies, tv and music produced in the past was also mass produced garbage put together by executives rather than artists. The stuff that everyone remembers is remembered precisely because they were the bright exceptions in the garbage pile and so survived to be picked up by later generations.

    9. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by smallfries · · Score: 1

      How would you try and replicate the measurement over a period of time that has already passed?

      --
      Slashdot: where don knuth is an idiot because he cant grasp the awesome power of php
    10. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

      It's actually the Tron Effect.

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
    11. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Racism basically means the only positive thing about yourself that you can find is the color of your skin. Try redeeming yourself in life with something you can actually control and stop polluting the world with your garbage.

    12. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And before anyone tries to argue that "40 years before that..." -- boop, boop, didum dadum waddum choo! It's always been stupid.

    13. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by jellomizer · · Score: 2

      I find the current voting patterns and ideals to be akin to what happened during the Great Depression. As much of this is from the end of the Great Recession.
      There are problems so let’s blame the other guy.
      The problem happened with the current system so let’s shake it up.
      We as a world culture had kicked out working, stable and mostly positive government for a different one because a strong arm personally is focused on a pain point of the system.

      --
      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    14. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      There's a great book "Everything bad is good for you". It compares the complexity of show plots between then and now... Now being Twenty years ago or so when it was written.

      Compare an episode of Mayberry or Hill Street Blues, to NYPD Blue or The Shield. Today we expect more than a simple single thread story. Hell look at Game of Thrones. They have more plot threads than the Lord Of The Rings books did.

      Culture has evolved in terms of what it can handle, even if the number one selling sandwich is the McDonalds hamburger.

    15. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So, 90% unreplicable, 8% fraud and 2% complete babble computer generated by AI to see if anyone notices.

    16. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by ph0rk · · Score: 2

      They're using population level data. You'd compare it to a similar population and make similar socioeconomic adjustments.

      For what it is worth, the previous findings were done more or less the same way. This one should have replicated the previous findings, and didn't. Thus the attention.

      For those that work in the area, this is something of a big deal.

      --
      semantics are everything!
    17. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Russia haters need to be censored. We love Russians. Only a racist would blame them for Hitlary's illegal email server.

    18. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by drsquare · · Score: 0

      In the olden days it was 99% garbage and 1% quality, now it's 100% garbage. Where are today's films that compare to the golden age of cinema?

    19. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm not Russian, just a human. And you are a racist twat

    20. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Ronin+Developer · · Score: 0

      Except, everything today is a dumbed down remake of an already dumb story. Not an original thought coming out of the current generation of screenplay writers.

      Now, look at the political scene where those working in the dirt and most affected by environmental factors, voted for a government run like reality TV and Honey Boo Boo or Jerry Springer.

      And, the other side? Well, they are responsible for creating those dumbed down remakes to be âoeenjoyedâ by all.

      Scary thought, is it?

      Now, get off my lawn!

    21. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      That's not how per-capita works, and yes, suburban whites are terrifying.

    22. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by mikael · · Score: 1

      For manual labour, craftsmanship in wood and metalwork required constant self improvement. These days, something like designing a yacht ship propeller is no longer done by hand but through the use of CAD and CFD software. That manual skill of knowing how a propeller should look like so that there is no cavitation isn't needed.

      Physics and mathematical calculations are no longer done by hand.

      --
      Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
    23. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by iamhassi · · Score: 1

      Not really, the world has gotten more complicated over time

      More complicated how? If anything it's easier. All the world's knowledge is now on your phone, no longer does anyone have to travel to a library and learn how to use a card catalog to find information. But life has been reduced to hashtags, selfies and 180 characters.

      --
      my karma will be here long after I'm gone
    24. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by ArmoredDragon · · Score: 1

      Whatever effect it is, it seems to apply to whoever published this.

      "We studied a bunch of Norwegians, therefore, this must apply to the rest of the world, rolling out any local phenomenon." And who the fuck cares about IQ? It's just about the most meaningless number that people throw around.

    25. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by ArmoredDragon · · Score: 1

      ruling out*

    26. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Notabadguy · · Score: 2

      In the olden days it was 99% garbage and 1% quality, now it's 100% garbage. Where are today's films that compare to the golden age of cinema?

      You must not have seen Deadpool.

    27. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nope, the study says no such thing. Only Norwegians are getting dumber. The rest of us are doing OK, thanks - except maybe for Sloshdat editors.

    28. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      It's Norway. The other day someone was on here bragging about how great the internet is in Norway. Therefore the natural conclusion is, the IQ drop is in direct proportion to the access to porn.

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    29. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I just found it strange that you were talking about cavitation when I have been reading up about that intensely over the past two or three days. It's odd how things that you're looking into appear all over the place no matter how obscure.

      I just found it interesting that cavitation is so wicked that it releases visible light! Anyways enough of my rambling, carry on.

    30. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's like a rounding error.

    31. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 1

      90% seems like a somewhat conservative estimate on the invalidity of social sciences.

    32. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by mrvan · · Score: 1

      By voting into power a 92-year own previous president and strongman who was actually the mentor of the thief they voted out.

      Mind, it's still probably a good trade, but a nonagenarian ex-president doesn't sound exactly refreshing to me...

    33. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 2

      Old people today act like the USA is so much more violent and riddled with crime when in reality we have considerably less violence and crime.

      They also hate it when you show them the hard data from local police, the FBI, etc. Crime really is very low, but it is against the propaganda campaign. My personal feeling is that we've reached a point where crime is too low. Crime can be the relief valve of an oppressive government, and our corporations do tend to make things fairly oppressive at times.

    34. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Sturgeon's Law. It was true then, it's true now, it'll be true in the future.

    35. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Type44Q · · Score: 1

      That's Sturgeon's Revelation.

    36. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's a very entertaining movie that I enjoyed. But we're not talking Citizen Kane here.

    37. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, a few texts between agents is a big conspiracy. Check.

    38. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by arthur5005 · · Score: 1

      Per-capita crime rate? *facepalm*. No, I think the study is right.

    39. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Part of that is also to sell films internationally and make it easier to translate. Transformers 4 was a big hit in China.

    40. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Mahatir promised to step down next year, and will appoint Anwar's wife as PM. That and the previous PM's corruption probe, I think Malaysia will see a better future.

    41. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Joce640k · · Score: 2

      I think there might be a grain of truth to it.

      In the first half of the 20th century people were plain ignorant.

      In the first half of the 21st century they all have a box in the corner of the room throwing out disinformation 24/7 as if it were God's Own Truth. I'm not just talking about Fox News, I include all the crap on the History Channel, the evangelical channels, etc.

      The problem ain't what you don't know, the problem's what you know for sure that just ain't so.

      (eg. that's not a Mark Twain quote...)

      --
      No sig today...
    42. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Joce640k · · Score: 2

      True, but in the modern information age we can know far more wrong things than before, eg. Oprah, 'History' Channel...

      This study might be reflecting the effect of all that misinformation. Everybody now thinks they're experts on complicated stuff but before they didn't even have an opinion.

      eg. Vaccines, Climate change.

      Opinion trumps pesky facts, real scientists and doctors aren't held in high esteem any more (or even listened to).

      --
      No sig today...
    43. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The number one movie this year was Ass....

    44. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Tron Paul Revolution 2008! It would have been like Trump but more effective!

    45. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Hell look at Game of Thrones. They have more plot threads than the Lord Of The Rings books did.

      That's because it is literally coming apart at the seams.

    46. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's that eventually, there are people who are frustrated with the system.

      Whether that system it worked for a majority (or even a moderate amount of people) doesn't matter.

      Sometimes your only choices are crap and crappier and it's just a matter of which is which to you.

      challenge: glorify

    47. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Tell me about it. Schools have decided to remove analog clocks because kids can't tell time from them, but they would use their cell phones instead. These same kids can't hold their pencils to write FFS.

    48. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Type44Q · · Score: 1

      Someone mod this the hell up; I have too big of a mouth to use my own points.

    49. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Type44Q · · Score: 1

      There's actually very little reason to listen to most doctors, since they possess lots of knowledge yet understand so little. Then again, a standard medical education is nothing more than a huge flowchart.

    50. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Type44Q · · Score: 1

      You're confusing "entertaining" with "intelligent" which is pretty amusing considering the topic.

    51. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by sound+vision · · Score: 1

      Can't tell if trolling or not...

    52. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by CaffeinatedBacon · · Score: 1

      Why should it 'look anything'? It should work and should not produce cavitation. If an AI can develop something that does both things, who cares what it looks like?

    53. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by toddestan · · Score: 2

      The difference is that there is now a huge world market for Hollywood movies. Because of this, the studios try to create movies that will also appeal to other cultures around the world, so they all kind of end up with a one-size-fits-all feel to them. In addition, they also want them to be easy to translate to other languages - or at least easy enough to follow for someone who knows some English but it isn't their first language. So they simplify a lot of the dialog and avoid using big words. The end result for those of us in the "home" market is that the movies do seem kind of dumbed down.

      The whole endless sequels and reboots is the studios being risk-averse and playing it safe, not really a case of dumbing things down.

    54. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by c6gunner · · Score: 1

      There's actually very little reason to listen to most doctors, since they possess lots of knowledge yet understand so little.

      This gets my vote for the stupidest comment of the year award. Are we taking nominations yet or is it too early?

    55. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You have a virus, here take these antibiotics.

    56. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by loufoque · · Score: 1

      Are you talking of a TV?
      That artifact from the previous century still exists?

    57. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by loufoque · · Score: 2

      Crime in the US is still significantly higher than any other developed country.

    58. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by loufoque · · Score: 1

      I think your entry is better.
      What he says is valid, but it actually applies to most professions.

    59. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by loufoque · · Score: 1

      Deadpool, with its rude farting jokes and unsophisticated humour catering to the lowest common denominator, is a masterpiece of modern filmmaking?

    60. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by edittard · · Score: 1

      Not the brain. Different body part.

      --
      At the bottom of the /. main page it says 'Yesterday's News'. Well they got that right.
    61. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by edittard · · Score: 1

      They can't be that smart. Just look at their handwriting!

      --
      At the bottom of the /. main page it says 'Yesterday's News'. Well they got that right.
    62. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by c6gunner · · Score: 1

      Which is exactly why it's so retarded. It can be said about absolutely every expert in existence, and tells you absolutely noting of any value about anyone.

    63. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      Why should it 'look anything'?

      So people will buy them, duh.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    64. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      Mahatir promised to step down next year

      If he doesn't then what? Does he turn into a pumpkin?

      will appoint Anwar's wife as PM

      That sounds almost as democratic as North Korea.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    65. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      This gets my vote for the stupidest comment of the year award.

      Seems reasonable. After all it's bad form to vote for yourself.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    66. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by loufoque · · Score: 1

      That is not true. A lot of professions require some actual creativity.

    67. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      These darn kids can't even use chisels and mallets anymore. What is the world coming to.

    68. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Exactly and at least 90% given the glut of studies.

    69. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Opinion rarely trumps facts.

      The problem is that science doesn't always provide facts. Often it is a theory and the evidence for theories vary greatly. Example, the Theory of Evolution. Non-scientists are walking around spouting that it is fact, but never mind that the evolution of certain things, such as eyes, are still unexplained, or thousands of other evidences that a feature on an animal exists with zero environmental or evolutionary explanation, and tens of thousands of more features are only explained by stretching evolution beyond the point of believability. (Note, this comment isn't about whether evolution has evidence supporting the theory or not, it is used as an example only. The point is to remember that evolution is still only a theory.)

      Some people no longer treat science like a methodology for investigating and coming up with theories based on evidences and improving those theories based on additional evidence. They treat science like a religion. They believe in the theories, even when they are unproven.

      An unbias scientist knows that all theories are only theories because they are not yet proven.

      When science says things like: "We know that the earth's core is Iron," they really hurt their reputation. The appropriate statement is that: "We theorize that the earth's core is iron. This theory exists because iron is so abundant, because of the way iron interacts with silica. The iron would have moved toward the center of the earth both on creation and the billions of years since creation. We also list to seismic waves all around the world and use this data to theorize about different layers of the earth, and we theorize that the core is a very dense material making iron a likely candidate. It would be amazing to someday to be able to travel or send a probe to the center of the earth to see what we theorized correctly and what we are completely missing."

      So please, don't say, "We know," when we don't actually know. No matter how great the evidence, the chance exists and is often very high that we have missed something that could completely invalidate an accepted scientific theory. When you say "We know" you sound like you are giving a faith-based testimony. You might as well be saying: "We have faith and believe that the earth's core is iron. We have faith and believe in creation via the big bang followed by the creation our planet from random colliding matter from the big bang, followed by evolution." In short, you are created a religion based on theories, instead of creating a culture of learning and being humble enough to know that their is always more to learn.

    70. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by geowar · · Score: 1

      The âoeidiot boxâ of the 20th century has been replaced by a global suppository of misinformation (called the World Wide Web). And worse than any âoedumbing downâ is the intentional ignorance of people that think that their beliefs are more importaint that any facts, logic or reasoning.

    71. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by ArmoredDragon · · Score: 2

      Someone mod this the hell up; I have too big of a mouth to use my own points.

      So because a few nutters were given a bigger voice by exponentially increasing communication technology over the 20th century, mean's were all getting dumber?

      On the other hand, maybe it does stretch further than Norway. So far I have here:

      - At least one idiot here that thinks the plural of anecdote is data
      - At least one idiot here who doesn't know anything about history. Really, not attending church every Sunday used to be a crime in almost all of Europe. But you know, a stupid channel that everybody but old people (and you) apparently watch, must represent the entire population.

      Besides, as loufoque below notes, what the hell are you doing watching television in 2018? I'm literally one month shy of being the oldest possible millennial by definition, and even I don't do that shit. This would only make sense if you just liked the advertisements.

    72. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by geowar · · Score: 1

      Back in the early 2000â(TM)s I noticed that the worse movie decades were the (19)20â(TM)s, 50â(TM)s, & 80â(TM)s (every 30 years) and wondered if the 2010â(TM)s would repeat this observation. A friend pointed out that these decades werenâ(TM)t just the worst movie decades⦠they were also Hollywoodâ(TM)s most prolific decades. So it wasnâ(TM)t that Hollywood was making more bad movies than normal⦠they were just making more movies (including bad ones).

    73. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by geowar · · Score: 1

      Nothing else can justify our âoeshit-holeâ president.

    74. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by K10W · · Score: 1

      I think there might be a grain of truth to it.

      In the first half of the 20th century people were plain ignorant.

      In the first half of the 21st century they all have a box in the corner of the room throwing out disinformation 24/7 as if it were God's Own Truth. I'm not just talking about Fox News, I include all the crap on the History Channel, the evangelical channels, etc.

      The problem ain't what you don't know, the problem's what you know for sure that just ain't so.

      (eg. that's not a Mark Twain quote...)

      You may have a point but for more than initial reason.Effect of misinformation is compounded by the fact those things fill vacant time. Less time thinking for themselves with higher exposure to what to think/what the group considers norm leads to idiocy because less is questioned and thought about. Some newish research seems to suggest filling all the gaps in life with technological distractions leads to less innovation and genuine focused thinking. Most "breakthrough" thinking and creative expressions of our intelligence comes in the gaps of life not mid task. Eg. It isn't in the lab at work mid task that some novel approach hits me but rather sitting in the break room with coffee staring into space.

    75. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by CaffeinatedBacon · · Score: 1

      Something is wrong with you or the boat if you are looking at the propeller.

    76. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The big difference isn't the quality of the content, it's the culture of consumption.

      40 years ago my parents thought of TV as an occasional diversion. They grew up in the 40s. I watched a lot of TV according to them, but compared to today's generation, I hardly watched at all.

      40 years ago kids ride bikes around the neighborhood after school until dinner time. After dinner we went out and caught firelies, flew kites, played hide and seek... I have three kids now. None of their friends do anything outside. It's all video games and 2000 channels of TV.

      Now, here's where it matters-- I'm also an employer. I have a real problem with employees who are confused that they have to actually do work. They tend to just stand around, talk about it then assume it will just happen.
          One day I was watching TV with my daughter. I noticed the show was in a workplace (The Office?) and everyone just stood around, talked about stuff and never did anything.

      Consider-- if you want to learn a language, immersion is the best way. If you want to learn a culture, same thing. We're immersing our youth in a culture of nimwittery. They're spending 4 to 6 hours a day there and their parents support it.

      Yes, there are exceptions. There were 40 years ago too. But these are the undeniable trends.

      Of course our culture is going to shit. It's the path of least resistance.

    77. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Don't be so pretentious. That movie was fucking awful. It's one of those that we all remember as being good because there's this cultural idea about it, but it's terrible, and if you honestly give it another watch without for rose colored filter you'll see that

    78. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Joce640k · · Score: 1

      never mind that the evolution of certain things, such as eyes, are still unexplained

      Complete bollocks.

      Out in the real world there's animals with "eyes" in every stage of evolutionary development, from single, light-sensitive cells all the way up to complex mammalian eyes.

      There's also animals that are losing their eyes because they went to live underground.

      --
      No sig today...
    79. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by mjwx · · Score: 1

      Ah yes, 40 years ago was a classic time in cinema. It's too bad we no longer get such intelligent fare as The Swarm, Laserblast and everyone's favorite The Star Wars holiday Special

      Or maybe... just maybe... you've forgotten that 99% of what was produced back them was garbage too, just like 99% of what's produced today.

      Sure, 99% of what was produced 40 years ago was crap... But the crap has gotten worse. There isn't a 1978 equivalent of Love Island... I can think of some 1998 equivalents, but these were budget shows which were relegated to late night TV... So much so I cant even remember the names of the shows.

      --
      Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
    80. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by GrumpySteen · · Score: 1

      There isn't a 1978 equivalent of Love Island

      Sure there was. It was called "The Dating Game" and, while it didn't show sexual scenes, the questions and answers were filled with innuendo. As a bonus, one of the bachelor contestants was a serial killer.

    81. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by dcw3 · · Score: 1

      Old people today act like the USA is so much more violent and riddled with crime when in reality we have considerably less violence and crime.

      Oh bullshit. Plenty of people of all ages do, so cram your stereotype up your AC. The only thing that's really different is that the media has gotten better at convincing the lemmings that things are so bad...more drama, more viewers, more profit. The rest of us can read the actual statistics.

      --
      Just another day in Paradise
    82. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by dcw3 · · Score: 1

      Yes, Deadpool rose above the trash, but the sequel fell back into the sewer.

      --
      Just another day in Paradise
    83. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by dcw3 · · Score: 1

      Culture has evolved in terms of what it can handle

      Culture has devolved into a disjointed, short attention span, thinly plotted pile of dung.

      FTFY

      --
      Just another day in Paradise
    84. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by dcw3 · · Score: 1

      I won't attempt to dispute your comment on the world's knowledge. However, I find "hashtags, selfies and 180 characters" worthy of a revolt. If you're life is reduced to that, you may want to walk off a cliff while you're staring at that phone. Nothing on my phone is going to compare to the experiences I've had in Machu Picchu, Alaska, Hawaii, and the UK this last year. Put down the fucking phone, and live.

      --
      Just another day in Paradise
    85. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You must not have seen Deadpool.

      Sorry. 101% garbage.

    86. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Did you really mean 'global suppository'? I suppose it works either way...

    87. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by micahraleigh · · Score: 0

      Is that why everyone is trying to moving INTO the US and NOT OUT of the US?

    88. Re: The so-called Flynn Effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Tower 7 laid itself down out of sympathy for the other two. But how did BBC predict it before it happened?

    89. Re:The so-called Flynn Effect... by KingBenny · · Score: 1

      psychology is not an exact science after all, despite the fact that the erudites of the psyche would love to it's not, the brain is an analogue system, if you try to box that into square excell sheets as data you will be missing an infinite number of states, wont you ? but far be it from me, the Unforgiven Un-degreed to speak ofcourse ... i don't know about this iq-thing, i rarely ever saw much difference between a so-called iq test and those things they make you do when you apply for a factory or supermarket : pattern recognition in sequences ? is that iq ? I never had it tested but i think according to classic tests mine would be slightly above average , i dont get the obession and fetish with it since the 1960s , it leaves out all the other q's .. i find for instance on a certain social network i have joined since last year the top brass being of at least slighlty above average IQ, severely lacking in empathy with the lower life forms and Eq .. two things that can't really be measured and there's your problem : it can't be measured in exact numbers ... so it can't be science :D i never missed the degree, i don't think it does anything to i.q. either, i think the power to understand is completely different from the knowledge absored, to quote the avalanches "sometimes a parrot talks" , ibm watson could win at jeopardy because it could hold a lot of data in his squared boxed mind, i dont think it could drive a car or paint a dali, although it might be able to paint a ruebens or van gogh after study it will probably never understand women hahah what is dumb ? accodring to sais analytical scientists dumb is not being good with numbers mostly i do rely a lot on external memory like i always say syntax is a waste of brainspace, its the logic that counts, everything else can be found by praying to the 1e100 for guidance, but i dont think thats a problem since i dont get stuck in one syntax and my brain only holds the system and routines for instance

      --
      Free speech was meant to be free for all... how can anyone grow up in a nanny state ?
  2. Wait, all of us? by Katravax · · Score: 2

    Or young men in Norway entering compulsory military service?

    1. Re:Wait, all of us? by wierd_w · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Unless there is something VERY special about Norway, a wide-spread trend that cannot be attributed to education, gender, religion, or other environmental factor has pretty good predictive qualities, since the sample size is large, and unbiased (Only males tested most likely, but the service is compulsory, not voluntary. That means *All male citizens*, not "Those that show up to the recruitment office".

      It means the sample is very very large, and that the trend is pervasive and wide-spread is pretty interesting.

      To rule out that something is indeed special about Norway, it needs to be replicated with data from other geographic regions-- but so far it is a pretty compelling argument using raw statistics.

    2. Re:Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Bah!
      Those young men entering Norway's compulsory military service from 1970 to 2009, aren't enven real humans.
      All you have to do is to look into their dead doll-eyes, to know they think and feel things like you and me.

    3. Re:Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      well, or all males that where to dumb to figure out how to get out from the compulsory military service.

    4. Re: Wait, all of us? by wierd_w · · Score: 5, Informative

      I suggest that you review the definition of the word "Compulsory."

      It means you don't have a choice in the matter. Or, that the tests are applied to *ALL MALE CITIZENS*. Since this is literally a sample size of "All male citizens of service age in Norway from the start year, to the terminus year", you are talking a very large and unbiased (by ethnicity, race, cultural upbringing, religious practice, affluence level, ... etc.) sample. The only demographic excluded is likely to be female gender, which I explicitly lamplit. Unless you want to make a compelling argument that women are intellectually inferior to men (*gigglesnort*) in the face of a wide number of well reviewed studies to the contrary of that assertion, there is no grounds to claim systemic bias of the sample.

      Hence unbiased.

    5. Re: Wait, all of us? by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 5, Funny

      I suggest that you review the definition of the word "Compulsory."

      Somehow, the fact that you’re having to explain what “compulsory” means - in juxtaposition to the topic at hand - seems both very hilarious and very apt.

      --
      #DeleteChrome
    6. Re:Wait, all of us? by Sique · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Well no. At first, every male gets tested for fitness, including the IQ test taken. Only then people are either sorted out because of unfitness or can decide to go to a cilivian duty instead of the military duty.

      --
      .sig: Sique *sigh*
    7. Re: Wait, all of us? by fazig · · Score: 3, Interesting

      For example when is the IQ test conducted? Before they are conscripted into service of before that as an evaluation of their abilities? Because you need to keep in mind that while service is compulsory in theory, in practice they do not conscript even half of the people they test.
      Maybe someone from Norway or simply with more insight can shed some light onto this. Wikipedia tells me that there's about 60k people available for conscription every year. But only up to 10k is actually conscripted. Even considering changes in population groth both numbers over a period of 39 years (from 1970 to 2009) don't come close to the 730k IQ test that were conducted. Of course the source is Wikipedia which provides some links to articles on news sites.
      There could still be some bias. If you also consider that you can avoid being conscripted via other means. Up until 2012 there was also the option to do alternative civilian service (Sosialtjenesten) instead of military service in Norway.

      Their findings are interesting nonetheless.

    8. Re: Wait, all of us? by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      Being kind to the GP I suppose it could be not quite everybody. Conscientious objectors, people exempt on medical grounds, people whose fathers have connections to the oil industry ...

      Nah. Fuck that, he's a tard.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    9. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Same has been observed in Finland military.

    10. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Thus a smart person has an objective to score well below the expected median score.

    11. Re:Wait, all of us? by HuskyDog · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Question:

      Is there any particular incentive to do either well or badly in the test? Does it affect your military service in any way?

      The point I am getting at is that military service was to get more or less acceptable then this might affect the motivation of those taking the tests.

      Simplified Example:

      Many years ago potential conscripts thought "Gosh, my turn to do my bit for my beloved country. I'd better try really hard in these tests".

      Today potential conscripts think "Bah, why do I have to do this stupid military service? I really can't be bothered".

      Result: Noticeable decline in IQ results!

    12. Re: Wait, all of us? by Kjella · · Score: 5, Informative

      For example when is the IQ test conducted? Before they are conscripted into service of before that as an evaluation of their abilities?

      During the intake ("sesjon"), up until 2009 all males had to go through that even if they'd be dismissed afterwards as not fit for service, conscientious objector or whatever. Then they'd choose to draft some of the people deemed fit for duty. That's probably why the study is to 2009, from 2010 they added a pre-screening because they did have a lot more candidates than they actual needed. And now the process is gender-neutral, everybody goes through the same pre-screening but in practice you don't get called into service unless you want to. Though it theory they can now draft all men and women of service age if shit happens, of course we'd never have time to equip and train them in an actual emergency.

      That debate was actually quite funny, originally it was mostly men complaining that why should they waste a year living in bunk beds and digging trenches and the women don't while the women were generally against it. The turning point was certain people taunting like "awwwww, of course us big strong men will protect you delicate little flowers" and feminists going "oh heeeeeeeeell no we can defend ourselves thankyouverymuch where's that's uniform?" Once it became their own cause then it was pretty much a done deal. Kinda like sex and porn, if it's women being what men want it's all hiss boo, if it's women embracing their sexuality then yeah hurrah. Even if it's doing exactly the same...

      --
      Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
    13. Re:Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I want to say that the study is probably wrong, because an average decrease of 7 IQ points per generation seems quite a lot to go unnoticed in many other ways, but here you are, failing to figure out why a test that might decide if you're fit for duty might not represent the actual abilities of the young men who would mostly rather not be conscripted. I for one couldn't balance on one foot with my eyes closed when it was time to decide if I had what it takes to be quality cannon fodder.

    14. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Problem with that is that if the recruiters want you to serve anyway you are going to be put in cannon fodder training.
      It is much better to do well on the IQ and perception tests and fake being physically too weak to serve.
      Having an inconvenient allergy or two might be useful too.

      That way, if you have to serve you will probably get a position as a signalist or get some command training.

    15. Re:Wait, all of us? by NicknameUnavailable · · Score: 1

      Look up the demographics of Norway over time.

    16. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      For example when is the IQ test conducted? Before they are conscripted into service of before that as an evaluation of their abilities?

      During the intake ("sesjon"), up until 2009 all males had to go through that even if they'd be dismissed afterwards as not fit for service, conscientious objector or whatever. Then they'd choose to draft some of the people deemed fit for duty.

      So maybe the people are actually getting smarter and tanking the exam so they are not conscripted into duty. Or perhaps they are just getting less patriotic.

      OR the tests are crap, which is frankly the most likely.

    17. Re:Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You're an idiot and have single handedly contributed to the decline of whatever gene pool is unfortunate to have you.

    18. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Each "fact" that you list is easily proven wrong. I feel less intelligent just for having read your post. Are you a journalist in Norway?

    19. Re:Wait, all of us? by BlueStrat · · Score: 1

      Unless there is something VERY special about Norway, a wide-spread trend that cannot be attributed to education

      TFS did not exclude "education". It excluded "parental education"...in other words home schooling...as a factor.

      Bratsberg and Rogeberg discounted factors like parental education, family size, increased immigration, and genetics as significant causes.

      IMHO in the US it's government-run public schools, the DoE, and the teacher's unions who are the chief causes (but not the only ones). The US spends more on education per student than anybody but the results suck the whole bag-full.

      If the US is to have any chance of halting it's decline it must totally re-think the entire current education system, not just throw more money at it or make meaningless tweaks to a totally broken system.

      Strat

      --
      Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
    20. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      You failed all the advanced portions of the test... Congratulations, you qualify for
      FRONT LINE INFANTRY!

    21. Re: Wait, all of us? by ph0rk · · Score: 1

      For example when is the IQ test conducted?

      This study isn't all too different than other similar (but now historical) studies on US populations. True, large panel studies like the NLSY are more traditional panels, but they don't do a good job of tracking between-cohort change over time, like studies in the TFA are well suited to do (with caveats: e.g. no females in this case).

      This is just one case that bucks the trend, but it's a serious one.

      --
      semantics are everything!
    22. Re:Wait, all of us? by ph0rk · · Score: 1

      Parental education is the amount of education parents have received. Not home schooling.

      --
      semantics are everything!
    23. Re:Wait, all of us? by F.Ultra · · Score: 1

      What does smart/dumb have to do with trying to get out from or performing your military service?

    24. Re:Wait, all of us? by F.Ultra · · Score: 3, Informative

      You will not be exempt from the service due to low scores in either, instead what happens is that the scores determines which kind of service that you will be sent to if you are included. So if you score low on IQ and low in physical then you will be spending your entire military service sorting laundry and other incredible dull tasks. And there is also no bragging rights in "Hey I score low in the military IQ test!!!".

      Don't know how the situation is in Norway but back when we had compulsory military service in Sweden you would include your service record score (after the service you would be graded on your performance) when you applied for a job and if you haden't performed your service then some employers would see that as suspicious (aka are you a mad hippy stoner or are you simply unfit for anything).

    25. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Is it also possible that the testing methods have changed? That the people being tested recently do no take it as seriously as those before?

      There are so many variables in this it seems foolish to consider this anything other than rationalization for funding an actual long term study to confirm a trend over decades.

    26. Re: Wait, all of us? by Citizen+of+Earth · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Take a population with an average IQ of 100 and mass-import a new population with an average IQ of 85 and what happens to the combined average? It shouldn't take a Doctorate in Mathematics to figure this out.

    27. Re:Wait, all of us? by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      Do you suspect the GP was homeschooled?

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    28. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I suspect many things happened in Bluestrat's home. Paint chips eaten, gas leaks, soiled underpants.

    29. Re:Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Or young men in Norway dumb enough for compulsory military service?

    30. Re: Wait, all of us? by amorsen · · Score: 1

      If it's anything like the similar-sounding Danish test, you can be a conscientious objector all you want, but you still have to take the test. Medical grounds only applies if you can't realistically get to the testing location.

      --
      Finally! A year of moderation! Ready for 2019?
    31. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Dumbass - the test is biased because they know it doesn't matter now. Previous generation takes it seriously, the recent generation does not. They simply do not care how they do on it. Your claim of unbiased is laughable, or you don't know what the word means.

      You have been desperately posting all over this thread trying to prove your point, without any evidence of any kind.

    32. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah more ragheads more SJWs ... queers the genetics ...sic ...

    33. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Take a population with an average IQ of 100 and mass-import a new population with an average IQ of 85 and what happens to the combined average? It shouldn't take a Doctorate in Mathematics to figure this out.

      At least it wasn't a mass import of blacks. Their average IQs are in the mid-70s. The ones you see on TV don't represent the average. They represent successful career actors who competed for and won high-paying jobs with loads of perks that a lot of people want. Go into an Ameican inner city to see real average blacks. Might want to bring some security.

    34. Re:Wait, all of us? by aliquis · · Score: 1

      I was suprised / somewhat comforted by the fact it happened to them too.

      Because I've think I've read somewhere that it's dropped here in Sweden too.

      With the Internet and it's information at hands and stuff like auto-correct and so on I don't need my brain as much, or in other ways. Not going outside and moving about doesn't help it either.

      Here we're getting closer to 1/4 of the population being foreign born and over 1/3 of it having foreign background so it's also being replaced.

    35. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nice dog whistle. The people from Africa need our help, and taking more from the people that have more than they need to give to Africans is the only thing keeping white people from being totally morally bankrupt.

    36. Re:Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > males that where to dumb to figure out how to get out from the compulsory military service

      Good luck finding a girl who takes you seriously without having done military service! Remember Disney's Mulan: I'll make a man out of you! Ladies seek men, not boys, to take good care of them and their children and not run away if the slightest hardship ever emerges. Uniform has great respect and desire in the female eye. Cosplay, neckbeard and basement sandal much less.

    37. Re:Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The study looked at intra-family decline of IQ over time. That rules out demographics.

    38. Re: Wait, all of us? by mrclevesque · · Score: 1

      "So maybe the people are actually getting smarter and tanking the exam so they are not conscripted into duty. Or perhaps they are just getting less patriotic."

      More varied media exposure and cosmopolitanism.

    39. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Have you considered the reason that Africans have less is because their species just isnâ(TM)t equipped to be part of the modern world?

    40. Re: Wait, all of us? by fazig · · Score: 2

      Good to know.
      Things worked differently here in my country. I got dismissed after a hearing test discovered something I didn't even knew. I knew that I have tinnitus on my left ear because of a gun 'accident' when I was a kid. But apparently I have some hearing loss on one of my ears. And they couldn't let me work near heavy machinery or with power tools according to them. I didn't even get to the infamous part where they fondle your balls. I suppose if I went just a year before that (some reforms happened in the mean time) they'd still taken me and let me do some desk jobs. After all I was already a trained communications engineer (just a finished apprenticeship, not university level).
      Anyway, out of interest: Since a lot of people here in Germany tried to fail their tests intentionally in order to be dismissed. And apparently they had methods to find out these attempts, what do they do about those IQ tests? It seems fairly simple to cheat there. For example take longer on every question than you normally would do. Or maybe the outcome of the test isn't that important in the first place for conscription? After all we didn't have such test here in Germany. Being smart is just not a requirement for a non-officer.

    41. Re:Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, some of us were born before the numbers started to fall. So clearly not all of us.

      I ask does a small drop in IQ make a difference in life? Its not like high IQ people have any better chance of being successful than average IQ people. And besides, I take drugs to dumb myself down just enough to be able to deal with all of you morons.

    42. Re: Wait, all of us? by mikael · · Score: 2

      Norway gives their young people the choice of doing community service as an alternative to national service in the Army. Only 10% of the population go to university. The majority of the population lives in small towns of 10,000 or less all along the fjords on the Eastern side of the country, with four larger cities (Trondheim = 120,000, Stavanger, Oslo = 500,000, Bergen = 265,000). There really isn't much air pollution apart from the cruise liners that use sulphur based coal. Main food in Norway is fish.

      --
      Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
    43. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Just look at the books of the prior generations- amazingly complex and most don't even have the vocabulary to read them. Especially when compared to crap like a A Higher Loyalty which seem to be written for the ig-nant (or average DNC plantation voter).

    44. Re:Wait, all of us? by Z00L00K · · Score: 1

      I think it's more the case that we are now always distracted by information overflow so nobody has the time to start thinking for themselves.

      In the 70's we got the newspaper once per day, a comic magazine once per week or two weeks and a few TV programs on a limited set of channels. Now there are hundreds of TV channels but really nothing to watch and we drown in news from the internet and we have a kiloton of special interest forums on the web. On top of that a lot of junk ads and spam mails.

      Quantity over quality in the information we get already from a young age is the point here.

      So - yes, we live in the "brave new world".

      --
      If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
    45. Re:Wait, all of us? by Luthair · · Score: 1

      I recall a number of articles finding that there was cultural bias in IQ testing. If there is now greater diversity in their population it could be the cause. Then again, kids today are dumb amirite?

    46. Re:Wait, all of us? by MrL0G1C · · Score: 1

      Or perhaps more intelligent people in Norway are getting better at dodging military service?

      --
      Waterfox - a Firefox fork with legacy extension support, security updates and better privacy by default.
    47. Re: Wait, all of us? by Megol · · Score: 2

      Don't know of a group of people with an average IQ of 85 so I'll assume that all people outside the western world are to be considered very very stupid indeed (that's a racist and completely untrue assumption but so is your idea).
      If I did my numbers correct that would lead to a decrease of 3 IQ points, that is by taking the number of immigrants not from western countries and multiplying by 85 adding the rest of the population and multiplying with 100. An IQ of 97.

      So even if your idea was correct it doesn't explain this phenomenon. But your idea isn't correct, Norway isn't mass-importing low IQ people and those people they "import" have a higher average IQ than 85. In fact some of them come from countries with a generally higher IQ which skews the equation in the other direction.

      TL;DR you are an idiot and also very, very wrong.

    48. Re: Wait, all of us? by Sique · · Score: 1

      No. Because with a low score, you are still fit for service, but the possible positions you can serve in are limited.

      --
      .sig: Sique *sigh*
    49. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Right, I simply phrase this is one basic question.

      "Name one well ran black majority country."

    50. Re: Wait, all of us? by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

      So: 'millineals are slackers who just don't care' is the explanation this time?

      So they are just being clever nihilists. Hmmm.

    51. Re: Wait, all of us? by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 1

      Not knowing the definition of the word compulsory is ignorant, not unintelligent. Reading the paragraph and missing the word is careless, not unintelligent. Knowing the word and reading the word and not putting it all together is unintelligent.

      It's not clear what he's guilty of here.

    52. Re:Wait, all of us? by Beeftopia · · Score: 1

      Unless there is something VERY special about Norway, a wide-spread trend that cannot be attributed to education, gender, religion, or other environmental factor has pretty good predictive qualities, since the sample size is large, and unbiased (Only males tested most likely, but the service is compulsory, not voluntary. That means *All male citizens*, not "Those that show up to the recruitment office".

      People are very different around the world. I mean in gross terms, all mammals want the same things - food, shelter, security, mating. But a sample of likely homogeneous ethnic Norwegian males in one geographic location makes it hard to extrapolate to the rest of the world. To say that male chihuahua dogs are getting larger in New Mexico says nothing about German Shepherds in Thailand. They're all dogs but there are a lot of different factors at play.

      People are not fungible. This study says Norwegian males are getting dumber. The next question is why. The answer is probably not obvious.

    53. Re:Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0


      Unless there is something VERY special about Norway

      Bland food? Bland people? Living where it's dark half the year? Education?

      There doesn't really have to anything VERY different, there just has to be something that's significantly different. There's plenty of that between each country. There's plenty of things that have been measured in all of Western societies that just don't show up anywhere else when they bothered to do the study outside of western developed countries.

    54. Re: Wait, all of us? by Ungrounded+Lightning · · Score: 1

      For example when is the IQ test conducted? Before they are conscripted into service of before that as an evaluation of their abilities? Because you need to keep in mind that while service is compulsory in theory, in practice they do not conscript even half of the people they test.

      So if they do well on the test they get drafted into the military? Perhaps a better headline would be:

      "Norwegian draft-age Males Are Getting Better at Faking Stupidity on Preinduction Intelligence Tests, Says Science."

      --
      Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
    55. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, TFA clearly implies that a few decades ago the slashdot readership was smarter than it is now (or at least less dumb). This is consistent with a large number of anecdotal reports.

      So it is hardly surprising that the subset of slashdotters who comprehend the implications of the word "compulsory" is smaller today than it was ten or more years ago.

      The skill of doing square roots by hand has been largely replaced by the skill of locating the square root key on the calculator. The skill involved in critically assessing news stories is being replaced by the skill of choosing the best social media and news feeds for advancing your status in your moiety.

      The world is changing. Please try to keep up.

    56. Re:Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Then for one, it is not all but half of the population: men. IQ test is strongly correlated with education and as far I know, for more than 20 years woman are more educated than men.

      In my EU country (seems similar in most occidental country), 58% of the master are awarded to women. 68% of the bachelors or awarded to woman. 43% of Ph.D only but it is changing with a very high pace (was like 32%, 10 years ago) and there are not so many Ph.D awarded relatively.

      Just seems like the education rate of men declined faster than woman rate grew.

    57. Re: Wait, all of us? by Riceballsan · · Score: 1

      that would make more sense in the US than norway. how many military conflicts is norway involved in right now, or in the last 10 years.

    58. Re: Wait, all of us? by senileoldfart · · Score: 1

      Unless, of course, you suffer from bone spurs.

    59. Re: Wait, all of us? by teg · · Score: 1

      Norway gives their young people the choice of doing community service as an alternative to national service in the Army. Only 10% of the population go to university. The majority of the population lives in small towns of 10,000 or less all along the fjords on the Eastern side of the country, with four larger cities (Trondheim = 120,000, Stavanger, Oslo = 500,000, Bergen = 265,000). There really isn't much air pollution apart from the cruise liners that use sulphur based coal. Main food in Norway is fish.

      Some corrections here:

      • 33.4% of the population has education at bachelor level or higher, not 10%
      • While it would be nice if the main food in Norway was fish, it isn't. Norwegians eat an average of 76 kg meateach year. Fish is less than half of that, and sinking.
      • The populations numbers are also way off... the cities are larger. E.g in the area around Oslo, the population is around 1.5 million
      • There was never an actual choice of doing community service rather than the military service. These days, it's voluntary. In the past, if you were accepted as a conscientious objector you would be set to do community service - but it wasn't a choice
    60. Re: Wait, all of us? by teg · · Score: 1

      For example when is the IQ test conducted? Before they are conscripted into service of before that as an evaluation of their abilities? Because you need to keep in mind that while service is compulsory in theory, in practice they do not conscript even half of the people they test.

      So if they do well on the test they get drafted into the military? Perhaps a better headline would be:

      "Norwegian draft-age Males Are Getting Better at Faking Stupidity on Preinduction Intelligence Tests, Says Science."

      Your result could impact where they put you. E.g. if you're bright, you stand a much better chance of getting accepted for e.g. officer training, pilot training, using complicated equipment etc. If you're stupid, they can put you in the infantry storming out of assault vehicles ;).

    61. Re:Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > parental education,

      Note the parental. I think there is a very high disparity between woman and man education (most higher education diplomas are awarded to woman) . This is fairly different than from the previous generation.

      >increased immigration,

      That seems something highly loaded politically. IQ is lower on the average in high emigration countries. If you don't detect an effect, you are definitively doing something wrong. Maybe this is not the principal component but there should be an effect.

      >and genetics as significant causes .

      As a bioinformatician, I can assure you that this is very hard to estimate. And I highly doubt that they tested people genetically for a significant number of SNP or more complex biomarker. They probably just only considered the DNA shared by relatives: siblings, cousins, ...

    62. Re:Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It is a know fact that education of boys is falling to abyssal levels for far too many decades. And still, all money goes in girl programs. The sample is biased.

    63. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The only demographic excluded is likely to be female gender, which I explicitly lamplit. Unless you want to make a compelling argument that women are intellectually inferior to men (*gigglesnort*) in the face of a wide number of well reviewed studies to the contrary of that assertion, there is no grounds to claim systemic bias of the sample.

      That exclusion is significant. Women have on average slightly lower IQ scores than men. Note that this doesn't say anything about how they stand intellectually against men, but since the study was based on IQ tests it means you are wrong, and excluding them will definitely prevent you from making predictions about the entire population as a whole.

      It could be that men got lower IQ but women started getting higher IQ scores, narrowing the gap. Or both went lower. Or any of the other scenarios.

    64. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It is a politically loaded subject. But you have to take in account more than the just the emigration. In Belgium/Netherlands, we are talking of allochtoon, the immigrants and their direct descendants. The natality in most European is far higher in allochtoon population than in local population. If you count, just first generation, you will get it wrong).

      A good biomarker to evaluate the effect of African emigration is the increase of prevalence in sickle cell disease. In some country, the prevalence got multiplied by 5...

    65. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This is /., facts are unwelcome.

      https://www.ssb.no/en/utdanning/artikler-og-publikasjoner/_attachment/287176?_ts=158d834b638 p. 16

    66. Re: Wait, all of us? by mrclevesque · · Score: 1

      Agreed, but it could still be a major factor in Norway, whether a lower incentive to perform on the test is consciously driven or not.

    67. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No. He just hates non white people, just like you hate white people.

    68. Re: Wait, all of us? by Pinky's+Brain · · Score: 1

      Giving gibs to a couple ex-African lottery winners doesn't help Africans, it only helps Americans and Europeans who came from Africa.

    69. Re: Wait, all of us? by ChrisMaple · · Score: 1

      Charity has no relation to proper morality.

      The immoral ones are the Africans, who don't control their reproduction and spread the vicious Islam religion.

      --
      Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
    70. Re: Wait, all of us? by liquid_schwartz · · Score: 1

      TL;DR you are an idiot and also very, very wrong.

      Rude, arrogant, name calling, think all the immigrants flooding Norway are smarter than average. How's the weather in San Francisco?

    71. Re: Wait, all of us? by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      To be fair, I did say "not quite". I'm more correct than the person I was referring to who seemed to assume they ran a volunteer army like the UK or USA.

      I am rather surprised EU human rights law allows such a thing, though.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    72. Re: Wait, all of us? by amorsen · · Score: 1

      This is an interesting point. Compulsory military service is actually explicitly permitted by the European Declaration of Human Rights. Conscientious objection is not even required to be recognized, that is entirely up to each state.

      --
      Finally! A year of moderation! Ready for 2019?
    73. Re:Wait, all of us? by lucasnate1 · · Score: 1

      I come from a country (Israel) where there's conscription and an actual war. For every girl who likes guys in uniform, there's also a girl who fucks discreetly with a slacker who didn't. Sometimes they may even be the same one.

    74. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I am white, you blistering idiot. I'm just not an insecure, moronic racist.

    75. Re: Wait, all of us? by Kjella · · Score: 1

      that would make more sense in the US than norway. how many military conflicts is norway involved in right now, or in the last 10 years.

      Having a large number of bulk conscripts makes way more sense for Norway. Apart from a few token contributions to NATO missions the primary task of the Norwegian defense is to resist a Russian invasion. Crueler tongues would even say it's to escalate any conflict into a full scale war and invoke NATOs mutual defense clause because realistically we couldn't win a war against Russia alone. In any case if it should happen the Russians would have the element of surprise and take out key infrastructure and troops everywhere.

      --
      Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
    76. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Fix the problem at home first. Have you ever seen rural poverty int the USA?

    77. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Because the military has no use for stupid people.....

    78. Re:Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Same guy, or same girl?

    79. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Culture will affect the score on an IQ test, so they have to be modified based on different cultures. So even if the 'imported people' were as smart as Norwegians, they may still score lower on the test.

      But that doesn't mean Citizen of Earth isn't a very very wrong idiot, there's enough stupid to go around.

      Do the 'imported people' even sit the test? At the same age? Is it even correlated to the level of immigrants?

    80. Re: Wait, all of us? by CaffeinatedBacon · · Score: 1

      "Name one well ran black majority country."

      Wakanda

    81. Re: Wait, all of us? by c6gunner · · Score: 1

      Wakanda

      I guess you haven't been keeping up with the news. They had a coup recently followed by a major civil war. That's on top of the fact that they've always been a monarchy founded purely on direct inheritance of power in which the upper 1% enjoy fantastic wealth and the benefits of advanced technology while the remainder live in abject poverty, eking out a basic existence in their dirt huts and mountain caves.

    82. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Did you watch the same movie as the rest of us?

    83. Re: Wait, all of us? by c6gunner · · Score: 1

      Congratulations, you qualify for
      FRONT LINE INFANTRY!

      ... but only if we ever get into a shooting war in which we've run out of ammo and just need bodies to throw at the enemy. In the meantime, go home. For modern infantrymen we need people who can do things like navigate, plot coordinates for air support and indirect fire, operate complex electronics, and understand rules of engagement and the laws governing modern warfare.

      We'll call you if any positions open up in the Cook trade.

    84. Re: Wait, all of us? by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      Being smart is just not a requirement for a non-officer.

      Because you just have to obey orders, ja?

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    85. Re:Wait, all of us? by volmtech · · Score: 2

      I an American who was drafted, I had gone into the family business instead of college so didn't have a deferment. The solider administering the test told us doing well on the test optional, we were going into the Army no matter what our scores were but doing well meant getting a better position. For me it turned out better than that. A few days before I was supposed to go to Army boot-camp I got a call from a Navy recruiter. My scores qualified me for one of the Navy's "A" schools. They had a special reserve program that after six months of Navy boot camp and the "A" school I would not have to serve any other active duty and just go to reserve drills once a month so I did that.

      They almost got me for six years anyway. I did so well in Machinist mate "A" school I was offered a chance to attend the Navy's nuclear power school. The catch was four years of service after the two year school. I had a wife, a young daughter, and wanted to go back to the farm. The wife left me after a few years, the daughter grew up and moved away, and I lost the farm. I guess I should have took that chance.

    86. Re: Wait, all of us? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'd be interested to know a bit more about the demographics... like if there's a portion of males who find a way to stay "out of the system" and thereby avoid taking IQ tests... and if so, what's the average IQ of those males? Just a thought

    87. Re:Wait, all of us? by micahraleigh · · Score: 0

      Studies also show removing options (i.e. "freedom") from a person's life can cause clinical depression and other brain deviations.

      Wouldn't surprise me if this is a Europe thing.

      No wonder people in Europe (including my ancestors) have been trying to move to the US for hundreds of years.

    88. Re: Wait, all of us? by terrycarlino · · Score: 1

      But is the sample unbiased? If it is comparing a modern multiculture population against an historical monocultural population it is not comparing apples to apples.

      For example if you are comparing a Norwegian Population of 98% ethnic Norwegians from 1920 against a modern Norwegian population of 80% ethic Norwegians and 19% others then the comparison is flawed.

    89. Re: Wait, all of us? by Megol · · Score: 1

      Rude, arrogant, name calling

      Thank you for noticing! Never been to San Francisco but I bet better than the weather in Oslo.

    90. Re: Wait, all of us? by Megol · · Score: 1

      Yes and there is a possibility that the "imported" people are of lower than average intelligence than the "native" Norwegians. But it isn't relevant, the idiotic claims in the post are.
      Norway isn't mass importing anyone, I've read about very skilled (and intelligent) workers having trouble being "imported" there. Even Sweden (the open door horror of the alt right) kick out skilled workers from time to time, Norway isn't as generous. 85 in average IQ is ..., an interesting choice of "imported" IQ, though higher than the claimed of Africans (by lower-than average IQ people most of the time) still not likely to be a true figure.

      Your points are of course very relevant too, at least a large portion of asylum seekers (which still aren't mass "imported") are not eligible to be tested at all. Allowing people not being citizens of a country to serve isn't a too bright idea and becoming a citizen often take a long time - and therefore making the people too old to be of interest.

      So totally bogus and worthy of getting a rude and arrogant response with associated name-calling.

    91. Re: Wait, all of us? by dcw3 · · Score: 1

      This is pretty much what happened with the ASVAB test when I went in the USAF back in the 70s. The low scoring folks ended up as either cooks or security police. Which always raised the question in my mind...what happened to all those dumb cops when they got out of the military? Don't answer, it's obvious.

      --
      Just another day in Paradise
  3. Probably atmospheric CO2 by wierd_w · · Score: 4, Interesting

    In the early 20th century, human living conditions, including improvements in sanitation, hygiene, and dietary needs being met likely all contributed to a net rise in human cogitative performance, however atmospheric CO2 levels have also been steadily rising in that time.

    Then there's this.

    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

    So yeah. Probably CO2 level rise has caught up to the benefits of improved standards of living.

    1. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by AbRASiON · · Score: 1

      I saw an article posted here a while back claiming that co2 is also really messing up plants. If I recall, they were becoming less nutrient rich or something like that.

      (On top of that, they are breeding plants to have more sugar and less focus on nutrients to boot)

    2. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Um, 400ppm is quite a damn ways from 600ppm, much less 1000 or 2500ppm. So *no*, CO2 level rise has *not* caught up with benefits of improved standards of living. Nice to see you fall within the parameters of the IQ study though.

    3. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by encad · · Score: 2

      It is probably a multitude of courses.

      Beside CO2 we have another massive pollution, especially indoors, that is artificial lighting. It messes on a lot of scales with our bodies, most prominently with our sleep patterns.
      Sleep has a direct and immense effect on our mental capabilities. There are a lot of studies out there, some even featured on /. a couple of months ago, that we big problems with prolonged sleep-deprevation, which factors in to this.

      Another point, from a pure personal perspective, that our culture also shifted (again) away from favoring intelligence and cooperation over personal success.
      Would be very interesting to see how a post-factual society factors into such tests.

    4. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by Citizen+of+Earth · · Score: 1

      It's a lack of pirates in full regalia that's caused this. Just look at the correlation!

    5. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

      This. There was that recent study that showed protein repair occurred during sleep, not to mention lack of sleep for stress and whatnot.

      Also, dumber people aren't weeded out as much thanks to improved safety nets and safer jobs.

      --
      (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
    6. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by Cytotoxic · · Score: 3, Informative

      Not "is messing up", but "could mess up in the future" in that very specific way, should CO2 trends continue.

      The idea is that food crops will grow faster and pack on more sugars (starches) in their seed, thereby diluting the amount of nutrients per calorie. They tested this by pumping in additional CO2 and confirmed their theory, grains grown in enhanced CO2 environments have greater yields with more calories per hectare, but less nutrients per calorie.

      This all assumes a static set of strains, with no action taken by farmers and seed producers to create different varieties that better exploit the conditions, and that grains are important for providing things beyond their core starches.

    7. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by Junta · · Score: 1

      I think blindly speculating things like this is a risky thing to do.

      There are plenty of very straightforward, negative consequences of CO2 that we don't need to be fishing for more, and *really* reaching to make connections. Tossing theories like this bolster the position of nutjobs that claim that this CO2 worrying is some sort of weird conspiracy.

      The world has changed in so many ways over the last 50 years beyond CO2 concentrations, and a great deal many more of those changes sound more plausible for explaining this data (whether this data means an *actual* decline in intellectual capacity, a failure of the metric to objectively measure intellectual capacity regardless of life context, some other shift in the population that actually takes this particular test, simply a different attitude toward taking the test by the test takers or something entirely else is not known).

      --
      XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
    8. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by WaffleMonster · · Score: 1

      In the early 20th century, human living conditions, including improvements in sanitation, hygiene, and dietary needs being met likely all contributed to a net rise in human cogitative performance, however atmospheric CO2 levels have also been steadily rising in that time.

      So yeah. Probably CO2 level rise has caught up to the benefits of improved standards of living.

      These studies are short term experiments addressing the question of immediate effect of change in CO2 exposure in office settings. They do not even attempt to address questions of acclimation over much larger time scales.

      For all these studies are designed to show baseline CO2 concentrations may well be irrelevant under a reasonable limit.

    9. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > It is probably a multitude of courses.

      English is one of the main courses which make me advocate Esperanto.

    10. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Why the hell would CO2 be responsible for a seven point generational shift in IQ? Is there even a slightly plausible mechanism here? If the increase in CO2 led to any kind of decrease in neurological activity, you'd think we could demonstrate it much more effectively than by studying generational IQ results.
      The much more obvious possibility is TV. We've shifted from actively pursuing our entertainment to taking most of it in passively. The more we as a society turn to TV and away from more intellectual activities, the more it will likely show up in tests of our cognitive abilities.

    11. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by Ferretman · · Score: 1

      People still speak that?

      Wow.

      Ferret

      --
      Sic gorgiamus allos subjectatos nunc
    12. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Carbon and coal burning have been scientifically proven to reduce IQ. I think you hit the nail on the head with this one.

    13. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I think the article was written by young Norwegians entering the army.

      Soil degradation is your culprit there. Because adding Nitrates to soil, and drowning it with pesticides and herbicides does not add nutrients to soil- you know, such as calcium and magnesium, iron, and other minerals that were in the soil (let alone vitamins), in the produce, and then eaten by us years ago. If we don't put back what we took away, guess what? unhealthy plants, unhealthy people (lack of nutrition). Not a lack of herbicides and pesticides. Which are themselves absorbed by the plants, get into the produce, and you eat it. Now you're being "cleansed" of pests and weeds from inside your own body. Guess what kind of effect that has on a still forming and growing brain?
      There are many books and articles that talk about this. Factory farming methods - Look how "agri-business" works today. I'd never buy anything from big argi-business, because they're looking at crop yields only. To their credit, they're thinking about feeding the people - and almost assume the nutrient value by default of what they're growing. Who wants to waste profit on putting nutrients back into the soil? Instead GM plants to be "stronger" and bug resistent to begin with - an argument that sounds like it makes a lot of sense. But we seem to have a collective amnesia on this subject, where asking your grandfather might yield an intersting fact: healthy plants are resistent to disease, and handle punishment from pests far better. So the symptom of failing crops isn't telling us there's a lack of herbicides and pesticides, but a lack of nutrients in the soil.

      All I'm getting at here, in a long winded way, is to say I think that in part, nutrition (or the lack of it) in the westernised world (as we tend to call it) has something to do with a decrease in intelligence.
      Personally, I believe parenting plays a part too. I also believe that education plays a part - and just as importantly, the interaction with other children, as they share, explore, and learn together.
      But what might shock you SlashDotters, is that I also question technology. Children of today seem to be far less social, far less able to hold a conversation, and are far less insightful. I think that last point is a symptom of a reliance on technology, just googling the answer instead of questioning, investigating, and making intelligent guesses based on what we know or have discovered. I think these more subtle forms of "intuition" are being lost, and may themselves be a reason for children wanting to just be told the answer - not discovering it for themselves.
      So as the younger generations are becoming less likely to solve their own problems, they're looking to technology for the answers, which ironically, from my point of view (right or wrong) adds to the problem.

      I think we really need to look at articles like this as a kind of wake-up call. Perhaps we need to re-think where we are, where we're going, and are we going to like it when we get there. Look at TV of today - how many shows paint a happy picture of the future. Where world problems are solved, and we are one humanity, spreading into the universe? Look how negative our cultural viewpoint has become. Go back to the 1970's when I was a kid, and I was desperate to be visited by an alien, or a time-traveller. Their future was always a better place - and I wanted that world-peace for my children. What went wrong? Why have we not found peace? Why is there still so much inequality? We need to solve these things before we retire, because is seems that perhaps current future generations won't be smart enough to solve it.

    14. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      artificial lighting. It messes on a lot of scales with our bodies, most prominently with our sleep patterns.

      Someone should invent a device for safely & reversibly breaking the conduction path. This would enable the curtailment of said illumination when superfluous to requirements.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    15. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by micahraleigh · · Score: 0

      When the government makes all your choices people care less and don't try as hard.

      When the brain doesn't have to work so hard people pay less attention and it undergoes entropy.

      No wonder more people are trying to move TO the US than LEAVE the US.

    16. Re:Probably atmospheric CO2 by doom · · Score: 1

      I think blindly speculating things like this is a risky thing to do.

      But our rapidly dropping IQs will never get that, so what the hell.

  4. Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by RyanFenton · · Score: 4, Interesting

    One important thing about this study - it shows that there is not a strong genetic correlation with any of these findings. That means it is very unlikely that this represents any kind of "Idiocracy"-like trend of the 'dumb genes' outnumbering 'smart genes.'

    Rather, as mentioned, it is a cultural/environmental set of factors.

    If this is replicated outside of Norway, perhaps we've been making ourselves more dumb, either by forcing our less-well-off to live without access to education, or distracting ourselves in such a way that we no longer pass tests as children anymore.

    On the skeptical side, while the Flynn effect studies counter for cultural-shift in popular knowledge pretty well - there could still be some measurement effect in there, like fewer students being able to cheat, or fewer administrators getting away with fudging numbers.

    Ryan Fenton

    1. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by wierd_w · · Score: 1

      I would like to see the same analysis performed in several geographic regions as well, then correlated against geological data for atmospheric CO2 concentrations over time.

      I suspect that there is a connection. Just evaluating from multiple localities over time would do well to establish the trend as a real trend, and not just a large anomaly.

    2. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Jarwulf · · Score: 1

      They said genetics wasn't involved because the implications of saying that it was right or wrong is a one way ticket to rejection and destroying their career. Unless they could figure out a way to argue that the base population somehow managed to breed itself 7 points lower every generation with no external inputs.

    3. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by thesupraman · · Score: 0

      Or just possibly the state paying people who are less successful to have more children while industry punished those who are more successful if they have more children has an effect?

      Oh no! That would mean success and IQ may be correlated!
      As that is not allowed.... Must be some subtle and complex socialogical measurement bias.

    4. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by ilguido · · Score: 1

      or distracting ourselves in such a way that we no longer pass tests as children anymore.

      I suspect it's that coupled with "no child left behind act" style legislation, that lowers education standards.

    5. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      it shows that there is not a strong genetic correlation

      Rubbish. It shows no such thing. To show that there isn't a strong genetic correlation, you'd have to do a GWAS, and they didn't.

      (They're inferring a lack of genetic correlation from the lack of familial correlation, which goes against decades of IQ research showing that IQ is highly heritable.)

    6. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by ooloorie · · Score: 1

      One important thing about this study - it shows that there is not a strong genetic correlation with any of these findings.

      No, it merely fails to find a strong genetic component; absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. There are many genetic and non-environmental effects that they simply wouldn't have been able to measure in this study.

    7. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Similar changes to various directions have detected in Denmark and Spain. Various decades have produce various results on average in Denmark (rise between 1959 and the 90s and then a drop), while in Spain the nutritional improvements have had a continuous positive effect on IQ. Norway and Denmark are culturally closer, so some comparisons could possibly be made, starting with educational policies. A decline from the 70s is really long, so the effect of such policies is questionable. Maybe it's the introduction of television into every home? From the 1970 onward, almost every family should have been able purchase a set.

    8. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Puff_Of_Hot_Air · · Score: 1

      It helps to actually read, although to be fair the article is terrible. The point of this study wasn't to demonstrate the reversal of the Flynn effect, that's been seen in many studies, it was to establish whether or not it's genetic or environmental. Based on the exact same decline when looking at families vs the general population, it rules out a genetic decline (i.e. the Idiocracy hypothesis). Good news really! The stupid people aren't outperforming the general population! Of course, looks like TV/internet something in the water, radiation, aliens, or something is making the general population dumber (probably combinations of things). Personally I think the upcoming generation is generally screwed with smartphones reducing parental facial interactivity. Still, will make it easier for the kids of those of us with a little self control.

    9. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They purposely ignored: "...factors like parental education, family size, increased immigration, and genetics..."
      So I'm pretty sure they did that on purpose to avoid having to publish things they felt uncomfortable with

      Immigration has been drastically increasing in that timeframe (1970-3%, 1992~5% and 2017 ~17% (% of population)).

      It would be career suicide to publish a link like that these days.
      It's kinda sad that we can't do science anymore for political reasons.
      I say this as an immigrant myself (brown even), to the US not Norway, but lets call a spade a spade and see whats what and not pussyfoot around.

    10. Re: Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It most definitely is generic. White population replacement from 86% to 64% over four decades directly correlates to a reduced population intelligence.

      Literally the single most correlating factor of intelligence for any individual is race. This is a taboo. It's well known, but study or publication is forbidden. Careers have been ruined for even hinting at the truth.

    11. Re: Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Race mixing.

      Same families, except for the new blood.

    12. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I did a quick search for CO2 and indoor air, and found a Canadian site for environmental health. Going to quote extensively from it:

      The average outdoor air concentration of CO2 is in the order of 300 to 400 ppm. Indoor levels are usually higher, due to the CO2 exhaled by building occupants. Human metabolism alone can lead to CO2 levels in excess of 3,000ppm, especially in poorly ventilated rooms. Indoor combustion appliances, in particular gas stoves, can also increase CO2 levels.

      The lowest level at which a human health effect (i.e. acidosis) has been observed in humans is 7,000 ppm, and that only after several weeks of continuous exposure in a submarine environment. In its 1987 Exposure Guidelines for Residential Indoor Air Quality,2 Health Canada set an exposure limit of 3,500 ppm to protect against such undesirable adaptive changes to acidosis, in particular calcium release from bones.
      The occupational limits for CO2 recommended by the American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists (ACGIH) are 5000 ppm (TLV-TWA) and 30,000 ppm (TLV-STEL),3 based on the direct effects on acidification of the blood.

      The occupational limits for CO2 recommended by the American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists (ACGIH) are 5000 ppm (TLV-TWA) and 30,000 ppm (TLV-STEL),3 based on the direct effects on acidification of the blood.

      The American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) Standard 62-2007 Ventilation for Acceptable Indoor Air Quality provides standards for ventilation based on surface area and occupancy. Typically, in an occupied classroom situation, the recommended level of ventilation would correspond to a CO2 level of approximately 1000-1100 ppm.5 A CO2 level of 1,000 to 1100 ppm is therefore offered as “a surrogate for human comfort (odour)” but “not considered a health risk.”

      If global CO2 only recently hit 400PPM, and indoor concentrations frequently reach 1000PPM, then I doubt that 400 vs. 300 makes any difference. Otherwise we would be seeing noticeable effects between people living indoors and those who live mostly outdoors.

    13. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Cederic · · Score: 1

      Except that there have been external inputs.

      Diets have changed, chemicals present in the air and water have changed, the education system has changed, lifestyles have changed.

      Any or all of these things may be relevant.

    14. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by JaredOfEuropa · · Score: 1

      The data was spans more than 4 decades. Maybe the Norwegians started to insulate their homes during that period, to suffocating levels. I doubt it though...

      --
      If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
    15. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      Or maybe we just stopped training people to be good at IQ tests.

      An IQ test is just a bunch of questions designed to test various skills that are thought to be indicative of "intelligence". You can improve your score with practice, without necessarily becoming some kind of intellectual or capable of getting a PhD in theoretical physics.

      Teaching bad changed a lot since the 70s.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    16. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Rather, as mentioned, it is a cultural/environmental set of factors.

      Not necessarily. It could be that humans just age slower these days. (OK, that could be to environmental factors rather than genetics, but it is probably not a clear line.)
      Life span is longer now. A 70 year old now is a lot healthier than a 70 year old half a century ago.
      In the 60's an 18 year old was a self sustaining adult. Today an 18 year old is still a child.

    17. Re: Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yep. It would destroy their career since they never even bothered to do genetic analysis.

      They would have to be very stupid, as stupid as so-called genetic purists have long been.

    18. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      You say the same thing every time.

      The question is how much you can improve your score with training & practice. Not that much, or there'd be people with time & nothing better to do pushing their scores into the 400 range and beyond. Heck, in Korea they'd probably make a televised sport of it.

      It's called diminishing returns. If Usain Bolt trains twice as long he doesn't run twice as fast.

      And yes, I say the same thing every time too. Difference is, I'm right.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    19. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Rick+Schumann · · Score: 1

      Personally I think it's because there are more and more 'conveniences' making people's brains lazy. Why bother learning anything, and more important than that, why bother disciplining your mind in the ways of learning (which would help build the neural pathways that enhance intelligence) when you can just go look it up on your smartphone or computer? Why learn skills (like driving a car) when there are more and more machines that will (allegedly) do all that for you? This is one of the reasons I'm against self-driving cars, it discourages people from the practice of learning a skill (driving). Some will say "Oh well those are all unnecessary skills that take up time you could be learning something else more useful" but it ends up not working that way, people will instead naturally have more 'leisure time' where they learn nothing at all, further encouraging their brains to get lazy.

    20. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This is Norway, not the USA. Norway scores very highly in PISA. What it probably means is that the tests (assuming that have not changed) either test things seen as no longer relevant now, don't test intelligence well, or both.

    21. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      AmiMoJo is a proper bigot. In light of evidence proving him wrong, he ignores it and marches on.

      The only real curiosity is how he decides what is true or false to begin with. Can't be with reason, for he ignores reason. Can't be with evidence, for he ignores evidence.

      Perhaps AmiMoJo does not initially ignore but his mind ossifies easily. Amusing to be a hard-right unorthodox conservative holding left views. Would explain the derision and why he hates himself so much.

    22. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by djinn6 · · Score: 1

      I don't see how a comparison of families vs. general population excludes genetic changes. You don't have the same genes as your parents. You have a mix of their genes + some random mutations. Most of those mutations are going to be non-expressive, but some will be negative, and a very small amount will be positive. Since there are genes affecting your intelligence, then just based on genetic drift, you will not be as intelligent as your parents.

      Not to mention there is a whole field called epigenetics, which studies gene expression. Even with the same genetic code, you can have very different results based on environmental factors.

    23. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      >access to education

      Absolutely not. We have unprecedented access to education.

      >or distracting ourselves

      Bingo.. probably. Life has gotten more complex and complexity makes it harder to focus. That means an overload of information that makes intelligence, the act of sorting through information 'correctly', harder to grasp. IQ tests are typically designed around a specific set of problems. But, as society evolves we have only introduced many other sets of problems that need to be solved. The natural result is that people are both less familiar with the specific problems and distracted by the many other forms of "meaningfulness" they can extract out of any given information.

      Consider this: let's imagine you make a test to gauge the speed of individuals. Your score is determined by how quickly you can run 100 meters. As society progresses, the scores are increasing. Everyone runs in their free time and as our distribution networks matured the number of malnourished people bringing down the numbers declined. But, over time, the culture changes. People value running less because of the invention of new devices: cars, bikes, etc. They spend less time running because they can enjoy the television or other activities. Instead, they focus their speed on the manufacturing lines. Their arms blaze faster than any generation before. Suddenly, the speed scores drop. What the heck? How could people be getting slower with the amount of progress we've made!

      Well, that's just a fun idea, anyways. It'd be interesting to see what the truth is.

    24. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If this is replicated outside of Norway, perhaps we've been making ourselves more dumb, either by forcing our less-well-off to live without access to education, or distracting ourselves in such a way that we no longer pass tests as children anymore.

      Nice bias insertion there. Except Norway is actually one of the most progressive countries, so if anything, they made themselves dumber by giving their less-well-off *more* access to education, not less.

    25. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by dougTheRug · · Score: 1
      I was going to call you out on this, but just to be sure :) checked the first fucking paragraph(!!) of TFA.

      Using administrative register data with information on family relationships and cognitive ability for three decades of Norwegian male birth cohorts, we show that the increase, turning point, and decline of the Flynn effect can be recovered from within-family variation in intelligence scores. This establishes that the large changes in average cohort intelligence reflect environmental factors and not changing composition of parents, which in turn rules out several prominent hypotheses for retrograde Flynn effects

      I also agree - this is super interesting. My first thought is that the trend was caused by mass immigration over the last 40 years. NOPE.

      My next guess is actually: drugs.

    26. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by lucasnate1 · · Score: 1

      Goddamn writing, ever since people started doing it, they lost their memory.

    27. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Rick+Schumann · · Score: 1
    28. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Amusing to be a hard-right unorthodox conservative holding left views.

      Wait, what? Are you sure we're talking about the same AmiMoJo who considers any down-modding of liberal SJW BS to be "censorship"?

    29. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by lucasnate1 · · Score: 1

      I'm much more worried about the fact that people don't know how to construct sentences, there are enough languages that do fine without cursive.

    30. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      If there's little or no net migration, then aren't you just reshuffling the genes? So over the whole population, in the absence of some selection pressure, I'd expect it to pretty much even out.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    31. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by ebvwfbw · · Score: 1

      Were you able to RTFA? All I can find are pay-walled links.

    32. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by Rick+Schumann · · Score: 1

      You're missing the point, intentionally, I think. Stop that.

    33. Re:Important note - the opposite of 'Idiocracy' by lucasnate1 · · Score: 1

      The only point that I understand is that you think that letting people do mental tasks that can be done by computers somehow makes them more intelligent, while I think that it's important to keep busy with mental tasks, but that one should prefer tasks that CANNOT be done by computers.

  5. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by wierd_w · · Score: 2, Informative

    IQ tests no such thing, and this study does no such thing.

    This study shows a persistent trend in the cogitative capacity of enlistees in the general Norwegian population over several decades using a (mostly) consistent measurement battery of standardized test scores.

    It makes no connection to education level.

    IQ measures how quickly a person is able to grasp a concept or detect a pattern, and how well they are then able to apply that concept or make use of that pattern to solve a problem. It does little else. Its main detraction is that there are issues in communication, since the tests are tailored for people who are English speakers, and who are literate, which biases the results of illiterate people who are otherwise VERY intelligent. It itself does not actually measure your education level.

    So, thats two strikes. Care to go for three?

  6. 2664 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Acing the S.A.T. will involve being in a cage with 2 crossed chains infront of you, with only one having the carrot slice at the end. If you get the carrot, you pass!

  7. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    False. Being basically educated is necessary to be tested, and higher IQ's correlate with higher intelligence and education, but to say they're testing for education alone is patently false and you're a liar.

  8. It is with the brain like any other organ by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The more society takes care of people, the less is demanded of its citizens faculties.Evolution takes care of not wasting unnecessary resources. It could also be that the Norwegian army has become better at screening applicants and we all know the better soldier is the stupider one.

    1. Re:It is with the brain like any other organ by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      we all know the better soldier is the stupider one.

      "We" who? Neckbeards who have not done one day in service and who get all they know about the military from TV/videogames/internet? Modern armies (actually most armies since WW2) work on misson-type tactics that require each and every individual soldier to understand the mission goals and to think two ranks above their own. A soldier needs a lot of technical and tactical know-how to properly function as one. The average computer wimp would be lost within a minute, but then the average computer wimp (let's say ALL computer wimps) avoid responsability and risk like the plague. Dismissed.

    2. Re:It is with the brain like any other organ by ChrisMaple · · Score: 1

      Stupid high level officers are deadly to the army that employs them.

      --
      Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
  9. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Having done the army test in 2003, as all Norwegian 18 year-old males had to even if they didn't end up serving, I can tell you it was a three part timed test.

    1) Mathematics
    2) Linguistics (In Norwegian)
    3) Logic/Pattern analysis.

    Education comes into play in the first two, and the third one is more about figuring it out as you go.

    You are then scored 1-9 in each of them as well as all the other testing such as hearing, vision and colorblindness.

  10. Similar results in Finland by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Interesting,

    I did read some time ago about a similar study in Finland, i.e. people doing the IQ test when entering the army. Link: https://yle.fi/uutiset/osasto/news/studies_show_average_finnish_intelligence_declining_since_1997/7792598

    There the "smartest" kids were born around 1977 and after that the results have declined each year. As in Finland army is compulsory for men, most of the men get tested around the same age, so the sample size is pretty significant.

    1. Re: Similar results in Finland by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There have been trends in Finnish education towards all-inclusive, no levels - all pass to next grade.
      Education is much more about being a member of society, than about logical thinking or even about becoming a productive member/slave of society.

    2. Re: Similar results in Finland by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That does not explain these results as it is a new thing and these are old results.

    3. Re: Similar results in Finland by Fireflymantis · · Score: 2

      As HuskyDog pointed out above, both these studies are using results from military screening I.Q. tests. A few decades back, afaik, military careers were held in higher esteem.. Perhaps more people these days just don't care as much about trying to look fantastic to the military, so when taking the tests, they just don't put in as much effort as they used to.

      Oh, and another thing: it could also be that any trend towards lower expediency, even if accuracy improved by some factor, would appear as a I.Q. score decline. I bet people are gradually forgetting and/or not being informed that I.Q. tests are timed severely, and are taking more time to answer each question, and/or wasting more time on a tricky problem instead of making a best guess and quickly moving onto the next.. Too bad the paper is behind a paywall. I'd be very curious to see if only the final score was used, or if its components (accuracy / time) were also analysed for trends.

      Anyways, until these scores are compared with another, properly administered, test dataset that is not within the context of military force, I'd prefer to remain a sceptic of these results.

    4. Re: Similar results in Finland by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The education declines also gradually - this being mainly the legacy of German philosophy undermining the faculty of reason. A particular example is the student rebellions in the sixties, when students wanted equal representation in the academia - representation without any merit.

    5. Re: Similar results in Finland by F.Ultra · · Score: 1

      The problem with your first theory is that if you don't score well on the IQ tests you will not be exempt from service but instead be sent of to the idiot battalions where you will be sorting laundry and cleaning cars and toilets.

    6. Re: Similar results in Finland by AHuxley · · Score: 1

      A mil had two options.
      Send out a "random" letter saying a person was not needed that year as the mil is "full" for that year. Get a few letters and that persons age range of years needing to be in the mil pass.
      Dont accept the person due to medical results after a person is given an IQ test. Call it a "language" test to see what they are going to do in the mil.
      Its an IQ test but hide in a few other tests given to all to join the mil.
      That could ensure only the people in the mil would have their IQ tests accepted. Low IQ people never really entered the mil in any offical way.
      No need for idiot battalions. As no idiots made it into the mil.
      All the plus side of a real skilled mil with the wider skill set intake of a draft. With the selection over an entire population able to pass an IQ test every generation.

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
    7. Re: Similar results in Finland by F.Ultra · · Score: 1

      There is a large need for the idiot battalion unless you want to spend a vast amount of tax money (of course conscripts is not free, but it's close to) for contractors to do the same job. Also I see no reason why a person with slightly less IQ should not be allowed to do this duty to crown and country.

    8. Re: Similar results in Finland by AHuxley · · Score: 1

      The idiot battalion would have to do the same task again and again and never learn the task. Not many nations have the numbers of advanced weapons systems to just keep getting used like that to 'try' with.
      People wth a normal and above IQ in the mil can get educated for a new system and get useful results.
      When the troops with a normal IQ go to war they get the same results without needing lots of extra time and lots of attempts.
      Troops need to know how to read a map, keep time. Find food. Work with other troops. Work in difficult conditions. Use a GUI and understand all the information presented on a GUI.
      Nations with large low IQ idiot battalions find they cant do much of the modern war and mil tasks.

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
    9. Re: Similar results in Finland by F.Ultra · · Score: 1

      This is a conscript army, after 18 months they are dismissed and a new batch of 18 year olds are brought in. And I don't think that you still get the idea since you write "Nations with large low IQ idiot battalions find they cant do much of the modern war and mil tasks.", the "low iq battalions" is not armed, they are sorting laundry and preparing food at the camp during peace time.

    10. Re: Similar results in Finland by AHuxley · · Score: 1

      When a mil is needed the skills expected will be beyond sorting laundry and preparing food.
      The level of literacy and numeracy is needed to use modern weapons systems to go to war. Thats why every generation gets IQ tested.
      To find the lower IQ results and not have to take weeks educating a person who cannot be educated.
      The question then becomes what caused that drop in IQ and why are so many citizens of the same age now so unable to pass tests their schooling should have educated them for.

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
    11. Re: Similar results in Finland by F.Ultra · · Score: 1

      You still don't get it or you have some agenda that makes you ignore the facts here. This is not a zero sum game; by including people with less IQ to do certain tasks they are not excluding people with higher IQ. So you gain exactly nothing by excluding the low IQ people from the military service. Nothing.

      And if you think that laundry and preparing food is not important in wartime you are ignoring history, logistics have been the most important thing in warfare since war was invented.

  11. "Science Says" by Mr0bvious · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Getting a little bored with the "Science" Says claims, like there's some governing body of authorised scientists that make things official.

    I've started replacing that term in my mind with "some random dude claims".

    --
    Never happened. True story.
    1. Re:"Science Says" by h33t+l4x0r · · Score: 1

      Don't look now, but you just supported the claim.

    2. Re:"Science Says" by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 1

      "some random dude claims"

      “... and provides supporting evidence to back that claim”

      You forgot to include the part you likely find rather inconvenient.

      --
      #DeleteChrome
    3. Re:"Science Says" by thegarbz · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I've started replacing that term in my mind with "some random dude claims".

      If you used to judge the content of the study by who wrote it, you were never interested in "science" anyway. Science was always done by some random dude. That doesn't make it any more or less right.

    4. Re:"Science Says" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Newsflash. A study conducted by social science grad students where n30 and p=0.05 after selection of subgroups for comparison should probably not be categorised as "science".

    5. Re:"Science Says" by geekmux · · Score: 2

      Getting a little bored with the "Science" Says claims, like there's some governing body of authorised scientists that make things official.

      I've started replacing that term in my mind with "some random dude claims".

      Some "random dudes" from the past were named Albert Einstein, Isaac Newton, and Galileo Galilei, whom ironically the latter was almost burned alive for heresy for the science he was reporting at the time. It used to take some serious guts to come forward with claims in society. Threats against the accepted norm were met with punishments ranging from ridicule to death back in the day.

      Today is we reward liars. Fake news is still cheap entertainment for the brainless masses, which is enough to make any fact-free bullshit go viral. Are we getting dumber? Dunno. We're certainly getting fatter as a society. When we limit blood flow to the brain by filling our veins with lard, I wonder how many IQ points get choked out.

      "Yeah, but...but...we built the internet! We're smarter!"

      Uh, just because we now have access to damn near infinite levels of information at our fingertips doesn't meant we're doing a whole hell of a lot of useful shit with it. Only 0.001% of people are getting a degree via YouTube. The other 99.999% of YouTube junkies are becoming the human equivalent of an Uncle John Bathroom Reader; brains filled with a metric fuckload of essentially useless information, refreshed and replaced with a daily ritual that has the logic and moderation of a Hunter S. Thompson drug bender. Should usage surprise us when internet porn is a Founding Father of the information superhighway? I think not.

      Bottom line is some people are getting smarter due to technical advancements and access to information, but society as a whole is likely getting a bit dumber. Or at least more dependent on technology to avoid having to learn. Of course, some call this taking advantage of technology. Others label it being utterly and hopelessly dependent on technology.

    6. Re:"Science Says" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      The phrase sounds dumb but your argument sounds even dumber, because there is a body of authorized scientists that make things official. These claims were made by people with a PhD degree and tenure as a professor, which is very obviously some form of authorization. You may question the authority, if you can live with being ridiculed for your lack of education then, but you cannot make the authority cease to exist by mere imagination.

    7. Re:"Science Says" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "whom ironically the latter was almost burned alive for heresy for the science he was reporting at the time"

      Historically ignorant, are we?

    8. Re:"Science Says" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      There is a governing body of scientists that makes things official. It's called "peer review."

      "Science says" is not the prettiest formulation, but there is a meaningful distinction between the claims of (a) researchers who collect actual data, know about biases and how to correct for them, and carefully document everything they do, and (b) people who pull stuff out of their asses in order to serve some agenda. I see no problem with labeling (a) "science says" and (b) "some random dude claims."

    9. Re:"Science Says" by WaffleMonster · · Score: 1

      If you used to judge the content of the study by who wrote it, you were never interested in "science" anyway. Science was always done by some random dude. That doesn't make it any more or less right.

      In a world with infinite time and infinite resources perhaps. In the real world integrity or lack thereof of those involved with paper is a necessary signal as to whether it is even in ones interests to waste limited time and resources with it.

      If people are systematically fucking up go ahead and expect it not to have consequences if you so desire. It's not the way the world actually works and for good reason.

    10. Re:"Science Says" by Sponge+Bath · · Score: 1

      Some "random dudes" from the past were named Albert Einstein, Isaac Newton, and Galileo Galilei...

      A patent clerk, an alchemist and a heretic walk into a bar...

    11. Re:"Science Says" by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      In a world with infinite time and infinite resources perhaps. In the real world integrity or lack thereof of those involved with paper is a necessary signal

      You've got that horribly backwards. You need some ideal world with infinite timeline and infinite resources if you want to build up a reputation based system for all scientists out there in order for you in the very very very distant future to be able to judge the quality of their work by the name on it.

      I suggest you get reading, you've got a lot of people's material to catch up on.

      Now without looking it up, who wrote the paper, and how have you rated the quality of all their work thus far? I bet you don't know.

  12. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by Darinbob · · Score: 1

    Well ya, if they gave English IQ tests to young Norwegians entering military service, I suspect they wouldn't do as well as they could

  13. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Spoilers; They don't. They test mathematics, linguistics in Norwegian and logic/pattern extrapolation.

  14. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by wierd_w · · Score: 0

    You just substituted "Norwegian" for "English"

    Otherwise, let's break down what you said.

    1) Timed test. This measure the "how quickly" aspect.

    2) Mathematics-- Math is about relationships between quantities. Many questions in math test batteries involve well known sequences (Fibonacci and pals), but this does not explicitly require you to know about fibonacci, since the sequence is readily identifiable-- eg, pattern recognition, and application.

    3) redundant, just optical instead of abstract.

    So--- really-- EXACTLY what I said it tests for? Hmm? :P

  15. The caption should have read... by HotNeedleOfInquiry · · Score: 2

    "Norwegians are getting dumber"

    --
    "Eve of Destruction", it's not just for old hippies anymore...
    1. Re:The caption should have read... by ET3D · · Score: 2

      Or "Norwegians are getting dumber, but are still smarter than Americans".

    2. Re: The caption should have read... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Eventually they'll be just as dumb (as a whole) than even Americans (as a whole) once they've become as multicultural as the North American continent is.

      It really is as simple as that. You can deny that of course, but IQ / intelligence really does work that way (inheritance) and the populations that are migrating into Europe and already exist in the Americas really do much worse on these tests.

      Or you can just blame trace carbon dioxide levels or barely measurable temperature differences if you want. I don't care either way.

    3. Re: The caption should have read... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If you spent the time you waste posting hate on Slashdot in the gym instead, you might lose the weight that keeps you an incel. Meanwhile, have fun getting drunk and "accidentally" passing out at the truck stop men's room to console your loneliness.

    4. Re:The caption should have read... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Or "Norwegians are getting dumber, but are still smarter than Americans".

      By a whole two points if you don't compare based on race and economic status, and Norway is trending down.

      Whoopsie.

    5. Re:The caption should have read... by AHuxley · · Score: 1

      Why would a normal population get dumber? Education would test all students the same as past generation.
      Any student who did not test well over many years of learning would get the support they needed.
      Years later the intake of the mil would be from the same academic level of people in a normal population able to pass tests over many years at school.
      Educational expert would have found all the people not able to pass any test every year.
      Did an entire generation get given no tests and who "passed" all tests and exams for an entire generation?
      The university system would notice that change in who they had to accept if a nations education system had changed that much.
      The normal academic results of a normal nation would be students educated to a past standard able to pass an IQ test from decade to decade.

      What got added to the population to totally reduce the IQ of an entire nation in one generation?
      Thats a lot of citizens not able to pass an IQ test in just one generation.

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
  16. And the incentive to get a good score is? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Come on, this is a culture changing over time thing. Who wants the extra scrutiny from the government that a good score might bring? Is there any patriotism left in the populace? Haven't they wiped it out by now? It's not like you get to fly fighter planes with a great score.

  17. Miscegenation by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    When you mix a hodgepodge of paint colors you get a hue of mud. Miscegenation degrades the Swedish stock, replacing intelligent genes with genes from lesser beings. It's been known since the time of Gregor Mendel.

  18. Television? by sgunhouse · · Score: 1

    First thought that comes to mind is the "idiot box". Though come to think of it there were lots of things we did in school that aren't covered today, so I can't rule that out.

    1. Re:Television? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The "idiot box" is spelt Facebook these days (there are a couple of alternative spellings, mind you).

    2. Re:Television? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I thiought it was the increase in "women's studies", "transgender studies", "iced decaf latte with a poof of organically grown cinnamon" studies, and all the "studies" that spend their time rejecting the entire concept of biology, hormones, or the measurable shape of physical objects as evidence in favor of whatever the stuident and their chosen victim community of the moment "identifies" as.

  19. COME BACK LATER.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    IM BATINâ(TM) !!

  20. our species is turing back in to apes by FudRucker · · Score: 1

    sort of like this infographic
    https://i.imgur.com/kE8ckkn.pn...

    --
    Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
  21. "we" are not by ooloorie · · Score: 1

    IQ is pretty much fixed within the first few years of life, so "we" aren't getting dumber. Younger generations are less intelligent than older generations according to this research.

    1. Re:"we" are not by Hognoxious · · Score: 2

      If younger generations are dumber, and people being born belong to the younger generations, then there's a net increase in dumb people.

      If older people are smarter, and people dying belong predominantly to the older generations, then there's a net loss of smart people.

      It follows that overall we as a species - which is clearly what the author meant - are indeed getting dumber.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    2. Re:"we" are not by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wrong. IQ isn't fixed, there are a whole bunch of variables such as stress etc, which can and will influence your IQ. Only arrogant, dumb people think they were born smart and that they are invulnerable.

    3. Re:"we" are not by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This presumes IQ is an actual measurement of intelligence and not a measurement of a specific set of abstract tasks. One cannot judge the quality of IQ test revisions without knowing what they are and what concepts of intelligence are attempting to be measured. Or perhaps the type of abstraction being applied on older tests is no longer how one thinks culturally. It is impossible to discount cultural differences. While a nation may occupy the same geographic space with the same genetic make-up, culturally we are a hell of a lot different than our great grandparents and do think differently.

    4. Re: "we" are not by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      IQ only ever really shifts within about ten points at maximum, it doesn't just flail around wildly and saying so is incredibly ignorant.

    5. Re: "we" are not by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Cultural differences between cultures are significant enough to actually shift the way people process information but this isn't true between a ten or twenty year cultural shift especially since this is a NEW trend.

    6. Re: "we" are not by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So, IOW, it's not fixed. Great. Putting words in other peoples mouth is however not intelligent. I'd say you've just outed yourself as an arrogant dumb shit who is a lot less intelligent than you think.

    7. Re:"we" are not by AHuxley · · Score: 1

      AC the mil needing troops to do complex tasks under stress is not "abstract tasks".
      The IQ test finds people who can work without help on the same and new tasks every day.
      A mil needs people who can use an advanced weapons system and who get that task done first time and with no need for many attempts.
      In difficult conditions with not much time to learn a new task and take in new skills.
      Something past generations had the skills to do.
      IQ testing allows a mil to test for that and if a nation has a drop in IQ thats not good.
      Why the influx of people who cant be educated to do a task? Who cant pass an IQ test?
      Do some maths? Communicate in a common language and use that language? Do a set task in a set time without help?
      Why has a new generation totally failed when all past generations of citizens could do ok in an IQ test?

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
    8. Re:"we" are not by ooloorie · · Score: 1

      It follows that overall we as a species - which is clearly what the author meant

      Well, yes, and unlike the article, the headline was ambiguous and misleading, something that needs pointing out.

    9. Re: "we" are not by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, yes, and unlike the article, the headline was ambiguous and misleading, something that needs pointing out.

      You really don't need to make such an effort to make yourself look stupid.

      All you demonstrated was your own inability to communicate effectively.

      Which I didn't need to point out, but I am, though I know you won't listen.

      That would require effort to recognize your own faults.

    10. Re: "we" are not by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      You're playing semantics. Is a person's ability at boxing fixed? We know sports people have on days and off days. Is that because the underlying thing itself varies, or because something like a filter is acting on the expression of it?

      It doesn't matter. Even if he was hungover and had flu Anthony Joshua would still smack the shit out of you or me, possibly both at once. But even something more trivial than that - a bad night's sleep - might be enough for him to lose against another actual professional.

      Do you understand statistics at all?

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  22. USA world leader by xxxLCxxx · · Score: 1

    Once again, the US of A is leading the world!

  23. "Young men entering Norwegean army" vs "We All" by grungeman · · Score: 1

    Who made the bold generalization to replace "young men entering Norway's compulsory military service" with "we all"? And would that person have been smarter forty years ago?

    --

    Signature deleted by lameness filter.
    1. Re:"Young men entering Norwegean army" vs "We All" by F.Ultra · · Score: 1

      Because it's a study on almost all Norwegian males (since close to every male is entering the military service) and the same trend have been seen in Finland.

    2. Re:"Young men entering Norwegean army" vs "We All" by AHuxley · · Score: 1

      Not all mil attract people to join by using ads in shopping malls. In some nations its like a "draft". Everyone who is able to has to do some mil service for a set time.
      Past generations passed their IQ test and could be educated to use the mil systems. Could work within the new mil tasks given.
      Now over that same population size, an entire generations of the same age, the IQ has dropped.
      Education should have found all the people who needed support over many years of schooling and test, as in past generations.
      What makes an entire generation not able to learn and fail IQ tests?

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
  24. No YOUR stupid! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Intelligence is overrated. There're plenty of 'tards out there living really kick-ass lives.

  25. Fuck, look at America by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    They fucking voted Donald Trump!

    1. Re:Fuck, look at America by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I know, shows the US is a reverse of that trend, right?

  26. Commercial television by evanh · · Score: 1

    It's the commercialisation of television. Free market competition has no mandate to educate. Education takes a lot of effort - which equates to money in market terms.

    And of course that's applies equally to Facebook.

  27. It's obvious, people aren't learning anymore by brainchill · · Score: 2

    It's obvious, people aren't learning anymore and committing things to memory. They just rely on their electronic devices to answer every question without actually going to the process of acquiring knowledge that stays with them.... so less brain exercise = lower IQ.

    1. Re: It's obvious, people aren't learning anymore by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No. Results are too old to be explained by current trends.

    2. Re:It's obvious, people aren't learning anymore by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Corporal punishment - getting strokes of the cane for not improving in school worked for me.
      It adjusted my priorities.Also if they spend 4 hours a day on fakebook and 4 hours playing video games or whatever, booktime decreases.
      Would like to know the results elsewhere.I also boosted my IQ results after I was taught methods to solve IQ test problems. Nowadays teachers have KPI's , so they maximize mediocrity, and encourage kids to cheat, and not the art of solving problems.
      Britain has A level tests, so the relative ratios should be VERY telling.
      In 1970 you only needed one income breadwinner. Now both parents have to work, and all these latchkey kids, and no parent will belt them for not goofing around. Thus Sweden should show a larger IQ drop.

    3. Re:It's obvious, people aren't learning anymore by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I second your premise. But the electronic devices (remember Donkey Kong? and Pong and other TV-games) are hardly to blame.

      Instead the education systems probably all over the world have been shifted from fact and logic based towards the subjective and the emotional. The education _systems_ have hardly ever been truly individualistic -- they have been built to support the needs of the state and the need of economy. But they have not failed completely. In order to support economic progress, the system has had to teach the children some critical thinking or thinking in general. The education has been integrated at least in some level.

      Today, the opposite is true. Children are progressively tried not to be evaluated according to any objective criteria -- the practice of repeating classes / grades has been abandoned and in result half of the population can't actually read.

      In few cases the curriculum has had attempts towards teaching abstract thinking -- as was when I started to learn math (in 1979). Instead of teaching the good old 1+1 = 2, 2+1 = 3 etc, we were introduced to the topic by drawings depicting triangles or squares, which had to be circled into sets, whose magnitudes were to be compared using one-to-one mapping. This was also about the same year that students were not separated to groups according to their skill.

    4. Re:It's obvious, people aren't learning anymore by AHuxley · · Score: 1

      That would show in other advance populations with the same wealth.
      What have nordic nations been accepting for a generation that totally dropped their average populations IQ?

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
    5. Re:It's obvious, people aren't learning anymore by RhettLivingston · · Score: 1

      Exactly. Anthropological studies have also been generally pointing toward a continual drop in intelligence as civilization has advanced over the past few thousand years.

      The brain is like a muscle. Use it or lose it or, in this case, never develop it.

      It would be interesting to look at changes in expression of those genes that we have identified as having IQ contributions across the age groups. The question that might answer is how much of the difference is just related to lesser training of the neural networks during the appropriate growth stages or the reduced usage of IQ related skills caused epigenetic changes (perhaps to waste less energy).

    6. Re:It's obvious, people aren't learning anymore by nickersonm · · Score: 1
      People aren't bothering to memorize things anymore, they're just looking facts up in books!

      [Writing] will create forgetfulness in the learners’ souls, because they will not use their memories; they will trust to the external written characters and not remember of themselves. The specific which you have discovered is an aid not to memory, but to reminiscence, and you give your disciples not truth, but only the semblance of truth; they will be hearers of many things and will have learned nothing; they will appear to be omniscient and will generally know nothing; they will be tiresome company, having the show of wisdom without the reality. -- Socrates

  28. Pattern by DeBaas · · Score: 2

    Looking at how the comments here at /. have changed, I too see a pattern...

    --
    ---
    1. Re:Pattern by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Exactly ! It becomes dull to browse and read hundreds of comments.
      We are less motivated in shaping a rethoric from the article and the comments and respond.
      We are just anonymous cowards since E. Snowden.
      Is there a trend for that since 2013 ?

  29. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by ooloorie · · Score: 4, Informative

    Education comes into play in the first two, and the third one is more about figuring it out as you go.

    IQ is actually defined as the common component of mental performance that is independent of domain and education. There are IQ tests that are independent of education and culture, but such tests are lengthy, costly, and tedious. That's why mass testing uses simpler tests that are calibrated for particular populations and are dependent on education, age, and culture.

    Your test is calibrated for Norwegian 18 year olds; a Norwegian 18 year old that has more education than average would score better on the test, but the fact that he has more education than average would also strongly correlate with a higher IQ. If you give the same test to a Norwegian 30 year old, the results would be meaningless.

  30. Unfortunately not enough info by ET3D · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I started writing a reply, then realised that without more information it's hard to analyse the problem, and the article isn't freely available, unfortunately.

    IQ tests don't test a single aspect of intelligence, and it matters what kind of tests have lower scores. Do these have more to fluid or crystallised intelligence? We could then further speculate what caused the particular change. For example, education has moved over the years to better address how girls learn, and it could have negatively affected how boys learn to think.

    1. Re:Unfortunately not enough info by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I too would put my money on education. The average marks in university entrance exams between the sexes were equal in my country in the mid 2000s. But the reforms have continued and now it has reversed.

    2. Re:Unfortunately not enough info by AHuxley · · Score: 1

      The mil IQ tests just want to make sure an average person can do a new task without having people around to help every time.
      Can write, spell, think, do basic math, take in new skills. Work to a time limit. Remember what was talked about. Recall new facts. Understand a few new tasks when using a computer GUI.
      Use a new skills after some education.
      What any normal school in an advanced nation should have supported and tested for over many years before that mil IQ test.
      The tasks any modern mil needs to have in all their troops. Its not looking for university level intelligence. Just better than the lowest part of all the test results.
      An average person who got an average education in an advanced nation should have got educated to some literacy and numeracy level after many years of schooling.
      When a nations mil cant find any of that education over so many people tested what happened?

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
    3. Re:Unfortunately not enough info by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > the article isn't freely available, unfortunately.

      https://sci-hub.tw/https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1718793115

  31. Its very apparent!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Since i'm now old I see every new generation.... Its is quite apparent.

    I blame the internet, its totally stunts any mental growth.

    If you what to know something, look it up on the internet, which is fine, but...
    if its something they could have worked out themselves they don't learn how or practice those skills.

    There is also all the time wasted on the internet... watching and reading utterly pointless crap.

  32. Its very apparent what? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You're a mental growth!

  33. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by serviscope_minor · · Score: 1

    IQ is actually defined as the common component of mental performance that is independent of domain and education.

    No it's claimed to be that not defined to be that. You can't simply define something to achive a near impossible task and pretend it actually does so. Well, I mean you can pretend...

    There are IQ tests that are independent of education and culture, but such tests are lengthy, costly, and tedious.

    Sounds like they're not IQ tests then. Also [citation needed].

    --
    SJW n. One who posts facts.
  34. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by Kjella · · Score: 4, Informative

    Well ya, if they gave English IQ tests to young Norwegians entering military service, I suspect they wouldn't do as well as they could

    My guess would be that the difference would be extremely low, Norway is consistently ranked in very top for English proficiency, you start with English in first grade and we don't dub English shows except for little kids. With Internet, YouTube etc. kids also get exposed to lots of material that's neither dubbed nor subtitled. The Harry Potter books sold ~1 million in Norwegian, ~200k in English so one in six preferred English and that's for kids. If you take any kind of higher education, expect English textbooks. Even though English doesn't have an official status, with a high number of immigrants and foreign workers pretty much everything exists in an English translation. Now if you go as far back as this study it would be different, but apart from cultural reasons we could easily make English our official language.

    --
    Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
  35. Air quality, nutrition and brain performance by Qbertino · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I'm sort of in the ADHD camp. I've read a bit about the subject and somewhat adhere to the theory that a) ADHD isn't as much a disorder rather than a genetic predestination. Roughly 10% of society being Hunter/Gatherer (creative, priest, leader, rebell, etc,), the rest being farmers/settlers. It's a bit of a chicken/egg problem: Do I have low self-esteem because im ADHD or do I have ADHD as a symptom of low self-esteem? Or is both linked to brain performance or is both linked to lack of social proof for aberrant behavior (minimalist stoic)?
    Childhood media consumption definitely plays into this, as it trains us to look for emotional states that are fully decoupled from the "mundane" reality around us.

    I however have also noticed how much nutrition and psychological factors play into emotional wellbeing and how much that plays into brain performance.

    Another thing that happened recently is that I finally had my nose-divider corrected (at the age of 47). I, for the first time in my life, can breathe properly. Or at least way better than before. The difference in my cognitive abilities is palpable. I can concentrate longer and deeper with less strain. I'm pretty sure that my confidence has risen due to that and that feeds back into my ability to concentrate. Sleep-apnosis is know to severely influence cognitive abilities (access to oxygen).

    Last but not least, I've noticed how extremely nutrition influences cognitive performance. Processed foods make me less concentrated and more sleepy vis-a-vis organic fresh foods. Again, the difference is palpable.

    Bottom line:
    There are some theories about rising CO2 levels and whatnot, but I bet dollars to donuts that if IQ really is declining again across the board that childhood media consumption and nutrition are the most significant factors playing into this.
    And I have some personal anecdotal evidence to back this up.

    My 2 cents.

    --
    We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
    1. Re:Air quality, nutrition and brain performance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm sort of in the ADHD camp. I've read a bit about the subject and somewhat adhere to the theory

      TL;DR

    2. Re:Air quality, nutrition and brain performance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Childhood media consumption definitely plays into this"

      I blame it on MTV.

    3. Re:Air quality, nutrition and brain performance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Assume diabetes does not exist... except that we have a set of conditions that defines diabetes, and blood tests, and real science. You may have an "attention deficit," but ADHD may not actually exist, as there is no scientific way to test for it. In the same way, many psychological personality disorders do not exist, and psychology does not really exist. What we have are models, and the truth is, psychology helps a lot more than it hurt, even if it isn't science. I'm just saying, don't be so sure ADHD legitimately exists. If you need it to exist, if it helps you, fine. But very likely it is in fact just a model to categorize individuals with similar traits of a wandering or short attention span, with the intention of helping those individuals. Don't stand on your ADHD like it is a soapbox. Soapboxes are real.

    4. Re:Air quality, nutrition and brain performance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The effects of the extensive use of computers, gaming consoles and now more broadly mobile phones (computers) must also play a factor. Not the computers per se, but how we use them.

  36. Doesn't matter by nospam007 · · Score: 2

    At least the president is a 'stable genius'.

    1. Re:Doesn't matter by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      It's easy to do an intelligence test. If you think there are more than two genders, you have failed.

    2. Re:Doesn't matter by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's easy to do an intelligence test. If you think there are more than two genders, you have failed.

      That's not even true on a purely biological level. There are genetic aberrations from the XX/XY scheme, and there are phenotypical aberrations due to gland disfunctionalities and hormone insensitivity.

      In those cases it's been pretty common to let the parents decide at birth on one of two genders and then operate and treat anything away that would not fit. The South African runner Caster Semenya has been the focus of a wild controversy about letting her compete as a female in contests since her genetic setup is not female, something she actually first became aware of by getting disqualified from international competitions.

    3. Re:Doesn't matter by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      With people like you around, people like him are guaranteed to keep winning.

    4. Re:Doesn't matter by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And now we are so dumb, we don't know any better.

    5. Re:Doesn't matter by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      As opposed to an "evil bloodsucking sociopathic vampire."

    6. Re:Doesn't matter by terrycarlino · · Score: 1

      OK. So you've accounted for .0005% of the population. Should we upturn 100,000 years of civilization because some 80,000 people out of a population of almost 7 billion have a genetic abnormality?

      But even if we give you that, then going with your premise, anyone who has a genetic aberration affecting their XY genes can claim genetic confusion. All the rest need to except they are members of the gender determined by their XY/XX gene combination.

  37. Brain Outsourcing to Software by pipingguy · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I still contend that computer usage makes smart people smarter and dumb people dumber (yet the now-dumber people think they're smarter).

    1. Re:Brain Outsourcing to Software by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I still contend that computer usage makes smart people smarter and dumb people dumber (yet the now-dumber people think they're smarter).

      Let me guess: you coount yourself among the smart people made smarter by computer usage in this contention of yours.

    2. Re:Brain Outsourcing to Software by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      yes and the last group you mentioned is often referred to as management :).

    3. Re:Brain Outsourcing to Software by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I still contend that computer usage makes smart people smarter and dumb people dumber (yet the now-dumber people think they're smarter).

      I do software engineering, and one major benefit of all the new tech is google. I can type a query and quite often find how to do something I either didn't remember or never knew, and I can do it quickly.

      Basically things like google and all the rest help to make up for a less than perfect memory or simply not knowing enough. In that way you can do significantly more.

    4. Re:Brain Outsourcing to Software by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      but prolonged use of the internet, and reliance on it for simple things, makes everybody dumber.

    5. Re:Brain Outsourcing to Software by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Possibly heavy use of automated devices just make smart people seem smarter but as they are just offloading workload to the devices (including memory). A raw unassisted 'smart' person is probably dumber. We're calibrating to not need native intelligence due to presence of external co-processing/technology dependence/emergent cognitive laziness/outsourced cognitive resources.

    6. Re:Brain Outsourcing to Software by ElizabethGreene · · Score: 2

      I still contend that computer usage makes smart people smarter and dumb people dumber (yet the now-dumber people think they're smarter).

      This does not match my personal experience. In self reflection I have outsourced a large portion of my long term memory to search engines, my attention span is vastly shorter than it used to be, and both my willingness and ability to deeply engage problems have decreased dramatically in the last decade. I am much dumber than I used to be.

      It "feels like" I only think with the top part of my brain now. I can reverse this feeling somewhat by dramatically limiting my internet and television exposure and forcing myself through long slow memory intensive tasks. Oddly, it is physically painful to do this now.

      (Anecdotal data is not data. I know.)

    7. Re:Brain Outsourcing to Software by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect

  38. Re:Trump is leading the way. by Z80a · · Score: 2

    If the US were any efficient in sending corrupt politicans to jail, you probably would need to convert a big city into a jail to handle all of em.
    But as it's not, well..

  39. Re: Trump is leading the way. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Troll

    And not a single piece of evidence in support of collusion. Your narrative has dissolved. Trump 2020. Your suicide 2020.

  40. Turn off your nick at nite old hogger by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You need to stop trying so hard. This is pathetic.

  41. Re:Trump is leading the way. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Trump blew it big enough this time to get his campaign chair in prison ALREADY, and it hasn't even unraveled yet. Popcorn, traitor bitch apologist? **(No popcorn for you bitch, it's for Americans not traitors going to prison like Trump)

  42. The decline is due to socialism by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Graduating from high school results in a 9th degree education instead of a 12th degree education like it once did. Public school education lags three years compared to what it used to teach.

    Captcha: boring, as in teacher please teach us something we do not already know

  43. Computers, calculators, lack of reading... by charles05663 · · Score: 1

    I know my skills have diminished due to electronic devices.

  44. Blame Trump by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...

  45. Different Skills by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Perhaps we are investing more time in skills (mostly technology related) that did not exist when these test were devised.

  46. Re:It is a fluke !! by AxeTheMax · · Score: 2

    While young Norwegians are a non random sample of the world population, your concentration on the figures instead show you have no understanding of statistics.

  47. Too many crutches so we do not think by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    We have too many helpers that answer stuff for us. Calculators, AI, computers, smartphones. I know high school kids who can't make change correctly. We have replaced thinking with depending on technology to do it for us. But beyond that we seem to be a race that has gone backwards in civility, respect for authority, and parenting has become dreadfully unfocused on the basics and creates too many kids who are lousy students. I doubt environment has anything to do with it. But society has everything to do with it.

  48. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    2) Mathematics-- Math is about relationships between quantities. Many questions in math test batteries involve well known sequences (Fibonacci and pals), but this does not explicitly require you to know about fibonacci, since the sequence is readily identifiable-- eg, pattern recognition, and application.

    Problem with those tests is that they have to be tailored at a specific education level.
    The more math you know, the more possible sequences you will find and if you go for the simplest pattern then "simplest" is subjective.
    It is trivial to find a polynomial that matches whatever number sequence they throw at you, but since the test doesn't check for method used and only for result your score will like that of a toddler.

  49. Study: Correlation betwen IQ and cytomegalovirus by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I have seen the presentation of the team (in Czech).
    Looked pretty professional and trustworthy source, but of course I have probably an already lowered IQ so I cannot be a judge of it.

    https://web.natur.cuni.cz/fleg...

  50. When measured with the metrics of the 1970s by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    When the tests were designed, different skills were considered essential and thus were the focus of education and training.

    I am sure that if you try antique intelligence tests on modern people, they'll score as being stupid as a rock. And vice versa.

    1. Re:When measured with the metrics of the 1970s by AHuxley · · Score: 1

      Literacy and numeracy is something any school in the EU should have had the ability to educate people with for many years of schooling.
      That is what an IQ test is for. Can a person read. Can a person do math. Can a person work with a task in a set amount of time.
      The ability to read and do school level math in a set time should not be new to an entire population of citizens that just had years of good schooling.
      Why does an entire generation not have the ability to use their own nations language and do the math they just got educated with in school?
      A nation with large amounts of people who are illiterate and innumerate? Who cant do a task without support and expert supervision?
      The education system should have tested for such people every year over many years.
      All the mil expects is that the people who sit a test can read their own nations language. Do some everyday math.
      So what is it with this modern generation that cant read, cant do math, cant be educated, cant learn new tasks, cant communicate in their own nations language.
      After years of education? Where would such a large population with no skills be found?

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
  51. Re:What do you expect? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You know what's funny? I consider you a sub-human monkey who significantly lowers the average IQ of any area you're in. And your post gives my opinion more weight than any evidence you managed to give.

  52. "They're not sending their best" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Immigration is certainly part of this. As Trump said (he was right too), Mexican immigrants coming across the border are not their best. Immigration is a big piece of the dropping IQ.

    1. Re:"They're not sending their best" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Another dumb comment by Trump. No-one sends immigrants, immigrants choose to migrate themselves.

      Immigrants are the ones who are motivated to make the effort in to moving to a new country and starting a new life there. This means immigrants tend to be more motivated and more willing to work hard than your average person.

      If you want to claim that immigrants are lowering IQ, please cite a study which shows this to be the case.

    2. Re:"They're not sending their best" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's a turn of phrase. I'm really starting to wonder if liberals have no understanding of rhetoric or abstract speech or if it's just another intellectually dishonest debate tactic to cover up the lack of facts supporting their arguments.

  53. Correlation with older mothers? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    At the same time IQ has been falling, average age of mothers at first birth in Norway has been rising. Per the CIA fact book, in 2015, the average for motherâ(TM)s age at time of first birth was 28.9. Per recent news articles it is now past 30. In 1950, the average age at first birth was 22.8, by 1970 it was 26.7. Women have had more options and opportunity to delay childbirth in western industrialized countries.

    Source https://www.demographic-research.org/Volumes/Vol2/3/html/2.htm

    1. Re:Correlation with older mothers? by Sqreater · · Score: 1

      A very good point I think. Nature is not an idiot.

      --
      E Proelio Veritas.
  54. Many such articles over the decades by Sqreater · · Score: 1

    Most probably what constitutes intelligence is changing due to social and technological changes. Analog clocks are being removed from schools, I've read, because children cannot read them in a digital age. And what about cursive writing? There must be many subtle and obvious changes that are affecting what passes as intelligence. It could just be that the theory and testing of intelligence is lagging the massive changes that have taken place in the last 50 years..

    --
    E Proelio Veritas.
  55. Idiocracy was a documentary! by shatteredsilicon · · Score: 0

    "The world's greatest minds were too busy curing hair loss and prolonging erections." Who'd have thought...

  56. Slashdot has gone dumber too by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's not the /. of 10 years before

  57. Intelligence isn't that essential for most of us by SurenEnfiajyan · · Score: 0

    Probably because modern technologies and medicine almost eliminated the natural selection. Even high intelligence isn't that essential for most of us.

  58. function of a time by geekymachoman · · Score: 1

    I have no science ti back this up, but seams this seems reasonable...
    It seems to me this is just a function of time we live in, and the hedonistic culture we kinda trend towards. Too much comfort basically, it's just a chase to get bigger screen tv, more RAM, better phone with more storage so you can dump more stuff on it, more comfortable couch, black friday sales 50 % off everything, etc. .. At least in the western world.

    People that have it hard(er) and are forced to think and improvise to survive (and if they don't, evolution does its thing..) surely wouldn't display same results on these tests.

    There were times people did everything by themselves in their lives. Now we have machines that do everything by themselves... or are trying to have them.

    I wouldn't be surprised if people couldn't read a map anymore. Fix their plumbing. .. insert whatever here.
    ... and I'm sure it's going to get worse.

    1. Re: function of a time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Exactly. Science makes people dumb. Ever since people had easy access to advances energy tech, we stopped getting smarter and inventing new things. We need to go back to living off natural lightning started fire, nit this modern day flint and steel, or worse matches and lighter version. I hear those idiots in the west even use "pilot" lights and artificial lightning strikes to have fire on demand in their kitchens.

      We strong men of Russia do things old fashioned way, fighting bear to death in lightening storm for cave. Man dies, he dies. But man wins bear goes out into storm. Pelt makes good fire when lightning strikes.
      Next day, we fight again. But first we make potatoe wine!

  59. Re: IQ does not measure intelligence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    8 14 23 28 34 42 51 59 68 86 ...
    What comes next? Southern state residents only please.

  60. But what about the spread? by petes_PoV · · Score: 1
    >quote>declined by an average of seven points per generation

    That is just the average change. Are we told anything about the standard deviation - is that moving, possibly broader or shrinking.

    Is it possible that some of the population are getting dimmer (or whatever IQ tests measure) but that the number of "geniuses" is increasing too.

    --
    politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
    1. Re:But what about the spread? by AHuxley · · Score: 1

      To fail a mil IQ test the person has no language, no math skills to show in a set time.
      A person that would need constant support and care with any task given.
      Illiterate, innumerate, unable to take in information about a new task, unusable to do a given task. Unable to recall any information about the given task.
      Its not the "spread". Thats the low part of an IQ test for that person.
      The number of geniuses has nothing to do with the number of people in a given population who cannot communicate in their own nations language.
      Who cant do math in their own language. Who cant be given a task and then recall the task without help.
      Who cant do the math their many years of schooling just educated them with for years and years.
      A massive number of people in a generation of the same age who cannot do a task, learn a task, recall a task. Who cannot read, write, do math, keep time.
      Thats all the mil IQ is looking for. A person who can be told to do a task and who can recall that task. Who can do a task with out needing constant support.
      Any nations education system in an advanced nation should have found all such people with testing and exams over the many years of schooling.

      Past generations could. The EU and NATO nations populations still can use their own nations language and pass a mil IQ test. Why the drop in some nations? What would change a nation so much that its own language use becomes a problem within a generation?

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
  61. Test quality by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Maybe it's just the test quality that has increased and we are getting much more realistic results than we got in the 70s?

  62. Shorter attention spans by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    People (I guess just people who use electronic devices several times a day) have shorter attention spans than they did in the year 2000. These two articles state that our attention spans have dropped from 12 seconds to 8 seconds, since the year 2000. (8 seconds is 1 second less than a goldfish's attention span.)

    The first article says, "a lot of that reduction stems from a combination of smartphones and an avalanche of content."

  63. It is NOT education! by bussdriver · · Score: 1

    1st) as flawed as IQ tests are, they make a strong effort to avoid testing for one's education because the whole purpose is to measure your ability to think.

    2nd) a great education can make you smarter but if you don't use it, you lose it.

    3rd) The USA public school decline since the late 70s has nothing to do with this study, that has to do with the American public which polled higher for education as a priority so then the Republicans took it up as a major issue when previously it was lower on their list and largely conceded to the opposition. It is the political war between parties that began after that point that has harmed the American education system. Not saying it is all the Republican's fault; it's mostly the public's fault for shifting their priorities but not enough to actually THINK beyond marketing slogans; although, after a certain point too high a priority makes you more irrational!

    4th) We all know but won't want to deal with the real reasons for this trend... stupid people have more kids and modern civilization keeps them alive and reproducing at rates never before possible.

    5th) Technology also greatly hinders development in children and continued mental activity in adults. Television puts your brain into a lower state than sleeping, for example. The consumer society of constant escapism has you going for dopamine fixes non-stop which not only distracts from brain use but also diminishes any intellectual highs one gets from figuring things out. Hell, even video games today are mostly just feel-good reward systems without any difficulty; perfected to the point of these addictive pointless mobile games. oh ,and don't read a BOOK and THINK -- checkout my cat videos on facebook!

    1. Re:It is NOT education! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The purpose of education is indeed to train the students to think. And what does thinking mean?
      It's the ability to recognize patterns -- and form _concepts_ out of the patterns.

      Without the conceptual thinking one can only guess at the IQ tests and not be sure one has come up with the right answer.

      The modern education is an enemy of thinking. And when I say modern, I say that with at least 50 to 60 year perspective with the progressive canon written about a hundred years ago. In US one of the major examples of anti-intellectual anti-conceptual mentality has been the adoption of the look-say method.

    2. Re:It is NOT education! by AHuxley · · Score: 1

      Technology would have a NATO and EU wide result on all IQ tests and all other EU, NATO nations populations.
      Why are some populations still able to be educated and still able to pass their nations mil IQ tests this generation?
      Television existed in most EU and new and old NATO member nations for generations.
      The consumer society existed in 1950-1960s UK and US generations. Their troops did ok over generations and could be educated to a normal mil standard.
      The USA and UK used their troops many times since the 1950's with all the changes to consumer society.
      No IQ problems with their populations.
      Video games existed into the 1980's. Generations passed their nations mil IQ tests back then.
      The counter to that would be the South African mil with date of its television service. The South African mil was at war for a long time and its troops passed IQ tests. TV did not do much to populations who watched a lot of TV. To educated populations at war with no TV.
      With the maps and new skills, learning.
      Warsaw Pact nations with a very different consumer society.
      Their troops could pass mil IQ tests and could read maps over generations. Lots of large scale mil events that needed troops with some map reading and time keeping skills.
      What has changed with this generation in a few EU nations that resulted in more people with a low IQ that a mil cant work with?

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
  64. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 1

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  65. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 2

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  66. Apparently... by OpenSourced · · Score: 2

    ...just Norwegians are getting dumber.

    --
    Rome taught me patience and assiduous application to detail. Virtues which temper the boldness of great, general views.
    1. Re:Apparently... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not really. The Americans elected Trump.

    2. Re:Apparently... by No+Longer+an+AC · · Score: 1

      Everyone else was already dumb?

  67. Blame Google by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Why bother learning anything, when the entire knowledge database of the world can be had at your fingertips.

  68. Re:What do you expect? by F.Ultra · · Score: 1

    You seriously think that the Syrian refugees that came to Norway just a few years ago would be drafted in mandatory military service? Really? And you are the one talking about people getting dumber...

  69. Or it just could be the tests are fucked by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    n/t

  70. Nothing new by igny · · Score: 1

    This study has just confirmed my own findings that both my teachers in my college and my students now are dumber than me.

    --
    In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is. - Yogi Berra
    1. Re:Nothing new by igny · · Score: 1

      This is also a sign of maturity of the Flynn effect, that is when you stop blaming previous generation for all the dumb things they did and start blaming next generation.

      --
      In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is. - Yogi Berra
  71. WE? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    No i don't think that's a WE.... NORWAY IS GETTING DUMBER. that's the real title.

    And since they let in all the muslims that rape their women and destroy their country....

    Yes.. yes they are getting dumber.

    not my problem.

    1. Re:WE? by king+neckbeard · · Score: 1

      I'm going to laugh my ass off if the reason for the decline turns out to be inbreeding. As an American, I find the hysteria over the tiny amount of immigrants to be hilarious. We've gone through that game at least a dozen times in this country, and the Chicken Little act is getting old.

      --
      This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
  72. HAH! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Joke's on you, i never got that smart anyway!

  73. Yes... I call them the 'iPad Generation" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This generation of iPad kids are seriously in trouble. They can barley talk to humans, they have always had 'simple' answers at their fingertips thats just enough. and physical labor isn't what they do. Why learn physics when you can youtube a 1 min clip to explain gravity.

  74. The environmental effect is... by Chas · · Score: 1

    Social justice.

    It basically encourages lack of actual critical thought. Rots your brain.

    --


    Chas - The one, the only.
    THANK GOD!!!
  75. None of us is as dumb as all of us by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If "the network is the computer" and we're the network, were going to end up doing something stupid like elect Donald Trump.

  76. As a long time reader of this site I can confirm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    the findings of the report. Unlike years ago, I should probably explain this now: the quality of the articles and comments has dropped over the years.

  77. Hold on, hold on by bonedonut · · Score: 1

    I gotta take a selfie.

  78. IQ tests are not a valid measure by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Human intelligence is not accurately rateable based on IQ tests - they do not accurately measure what they set out to.

    You can't distil any single person/creatures intelligence, into a unitary number ffs - it's an utterly stupid concept.

    1. Re:IQ tests are not a valid measure by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      You're talking bollocks. IQ tests are the most thoroughly researched and proven psychometric tests known to psychology. No other psychometric test has come even half way to its level of predictive correlation with actual outcomes.

    2. Re:IQ tests are not a valid measure by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The field of psychology is full of pseudoscience and utter nonsense. They are not scientists - not anymore than propaganda-peddling economists are. IQ tests are not 'proven' - that's a claim without any backing - philosophers of science (the people who get to decide upon the overall quality of research of entire fields of study - from string theory in physics being a waste of time, to economics being a 'dismal science') cast deep skepticism on IQ testing and much of psychology.

    3. Re:IQ tests are not a valid measure by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      http://science.sciencemag.org/content/351/6277/1037.2
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_quotient#Social_correlations
      Don't let your religious beliefs bite you on the ass on your way out.

  79. Sort of compulsory by Roger+W+Moore · · Score: 1

    There are always exceptions to military service for health, disability, conscientious objections to killing people etc. So it is possible that this study just shows that brighter individuals are using those exceptions to avoid military service.

    Indeed if you look at what wikipedia has to say it seems that while 60,000 are available for conscription every year only 8-10,000 are actually conscripted. The article also suggests that they select "unmotivated" fit people and you can get out of it with a "good reason".

    I'd argue that these selection biases mean that you are less likely to conscript smart people since they are more likely to be able to figure out what they need to do to avoid conscription.

  80. We made everything idiot-proof by Ichijo · · Score: 1

    And the Universe responded by making bigger and better idiots.

    --
    Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
  81. who knows? by cascadingstylesheet · · Score: 1

    Bratsberg and Rogeberg discounted factors like parental education, family size, increased immigration, and genetics as significant causes.

    TFS forgot "tried to" ... confounding factors are, well, confounding sometimes ...

    I seem to recall Norway transitioning from Bokmal to Nynorsk ... not sure the exact timeframe or how complete it was? Maybe that could have some effect?

    1. Re:who knows? by AHuxley · · Score: 1

      Yet past generations could to pass a mil IQ test.
      Thats a person today who is innumerate, illiterate, who cant learn a task, who cant work to time.
      Who cant recall a task. Who has to have help with every task given.
      Why cant a generation educated at school in their own nation use the skills they got educated with for many years?
      Cant use the math they just got educated with for many years?
      Cant communicate in their nations own language?
      Do not have skills to be learn after yeas and years of schooling?
      Thats a very strange change to one generation given the mil standards are very, very low. The parents generation passed the mil IQ test just fine. So the past generations genetics, education and family size did not see past generations have low IQ problems. They could do an IQ test, show they could do a task, use their own language, do math, work within a time limit.
      So who cant use language, cant be educated, cant do math, cant read, cant write, cant keep time, cant recall a task? In such numbers as to change the results of a nations mil IQ test past generations could do?

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
  82. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by cascadingstylesheet · · Score: 2

    2) Linguistics (In Norwegian)

    In Nynorsk or bokmal?

  83. or lazy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I figure its a result of not having to think for oneself.

  84. Remember to thank a teacher. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I won't waste my time reading this. The problem I'm sure is a result of television and movies. How they are created is just as important as content. With the 5 second rule, no one camera should be shown for more than 5 seconds unless to emphasize a dramatic event, and action shots not lasting more than 1 second the brain can't focus on the content. For this reason is why we get so many special effects movies with garbage writing as 80% of people don't even understand or realize their is a 'plot', just flash and sizzle that captures their attention.

    With the decline of attention span, we become more impatient, nervous, angry, and in general less social. Add in the content of sick violence that defies good taste and you have Hollywood's finest showing what they really think of you and what they want to do to you if they could. lol

    Second point which is repeated every decade or so, there IS NO IQ TEST. Search for the originals of the so-called "IQ TEST" and you'll see that this test was designed for children and the authors even acknowledged that this is not appropriate for adults.

    Yes, our education system sucks. But that isn't the same as an "IQ test".

    Disagree, answer this question. If our education system is so good, tell me what job you were qualified to perform upon graduation that didn't require any further education? With the exception of technical schools you weren't even qualified to work at McDonalds as you couldn't perform a single task there without instructions, and that includes cleaning the floors!!!!

  85. Brawndo by PhaxMohdem · · Score: 1

    People need more electrolytes. It's what IQ craves.

    --

    The Property of One's : "The Oneitude is directly proportional to the Colditude of the one." - S.B.

  86. Re: Trump is leading the way. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Read the OIG report if you want the truth, this was a setup from the beginning. Only democrap sheep believe Russia had anything to do with it- yet don't even want to talk about Uranium One for some reason.. Muellers team was created to overturn the election, and at least half of them are on record expressing that. AND if somehow that does happen civil war becomes a possibility. Can you think past your hatred of Trump. It's like saying you don't like you Dr. so hopefully he fcks up your surgery so you can sue him- idiotic.

  87. Re: IQ does not measure intelligence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    They have designed tests which are not biased in this way, used specifically to test people from impoverished nations, Amazon tribes, etc.

    Care to guess what happens when they give the same test to anyone else?

    It's a measure of what we (western society) define as "intelligent". You're trying to redefine intelligence, which is fine for you, but irrelevant to the science. If you want to test everyone for some other traits, go for it, but that doesn't mean previous "intelligence" tests are wrong or inaccurate. They just didn't test what you were looking for.

  88. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by Junta · · Score: 1

    I'd say timed test of math performance very much depends on "training" if not education. Growing up I was forced to do a lot of math manually over and over and over again. I very quickly understood *how* to do it, but it was tedious and over time I got quicker by memorizing big 'short cuts' so I could do the same problems faster, not because I understood it any better but because I had memorized shortcuts and understood how to break up the problem to use those shortcuts. Already I'm far slower at doing arithmetic in my head than people older than me because most of the time I had offloaded the tedium to a calculator. Now the vast majority of people have a calculator with them at all times, it would be natural for simple arithmetic to take longer, but that doesn't say the math is any less understood.

    It is very difficult to imagine some objective measure of mental capacity that *didn't* get influenced by training. At the very least the suggestion that this *specific* test has shortcomings seems to be the point in this thread.

    Besides, even as the tests have been consistent year to year, the broader context of what life demands of our brains have not. A person well equipped with respect to the mental demands of the world 40 years ago would not necessarily be well equipped for the world today, and vice-versa. We may have high ambitions of how we conceptualize intelligence in an abstract way, but in practice we can't really measure without *some* educational/life experience bias.

    --
    XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
  89. I'd say probably due to a lack of B vitamins. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    They are required by the brain to function.
    And they have been increasingly missing in the so-called "food" we eat nowadays, and get used up by it during digestion.

    But frankly ... there are a lot of hypotheses. Unless we actually check them, we can speculate a thousand years, and get nowhere. (And it will be too late by then anyway.)

  90. In my country... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    In my country there has been a continual push away from the idea of "failure" for the last 40 years. I am curious if this lack of negative feedback has had an effect on our cultural work ethic.

    It would be a mistake to correlate this to the results of this study though, as the population of my country entering Norway's armed forced is statistically insignificant.

    I would be curious to know if a similar phenomenon exists in that country. Can any native Norwegians speak to the prevalence of participation trophies, unscored sports games, and educational "failing up" in your homeland?

  91. Speak for yourself! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Lol. Some of us are still sufficiently brained, but yes, many are definitely sliding. I think it's largely conditioning and learned helplessness thanks to bad parenting, mainly liberal (though not exclusively) government agendas, and various addictions, though. I suspect this comes from millennials looking at their own generation, and indeed, you are more stupid and less competent than people were even 25 years ago. Don't lump the rest of us (yes, we do exist, and if we didn't you wouldn't enjoy the ease you can't seem to find a drop of gratitude for that our hard work has provided and does provide) in there, we do not suffer from snowflakeitis. It is why we are the actual generation that doesn't get to retire, we will be carrying millennial asses to our graves. Good luck after that.

  92. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by AHuxley · · Score: 1

    AC the tests show if a person can take in information and use it.
    Without having someone smart around to help that low IQ person with the most simple of tasks.
    Any task. A new task, the same task done yesterday, a task that just got introduced.
    Thats the very lowest IQ a modern mil will accept from an entire population of people.
    Why? A mil wants everyone who can be used to go to war.
    But not the people who cannot work without needing another person to help them.
    Thats why IQ is used to sort an entire population every generation. The testing finds everyone who can be used in a modern mil.
    As many people as possible.
    Why is the testing showing bad results? The national IQ has moved in the wrong direction. Something has changed. A larger number of people with a low IQ of testing age are now taking the tests every other generation could pass.
    Something has changed with the nations education and level of IQ over the past decade. Something new got introduced to the population to make its unable to do basic tasks past generations could.
    A mil is not a sheltered workshop and does not have the troops to spare to help people with a low IQ with every task.
    A normal nation with a normal population that can be educated should not change unless a large number of new people with a much lower IQ got introduced.
    Thats why the mil tests for IQ. To ensure they only get people who can get a command and have the skill to do what they are told without needing extra people around to ensure the task is done.

    A mil can avoid this by ensuring a nations education system is great and accepting the best from that generation.
    Become a mil that only accepts professional people.
    Attempt to test people for "IQ" (eg hidden as a fun new word recognition test) and only accept people above say the lowest third of results. A modern normal mil does not want that lowest IQ part of their intake to grow. Ever.
    A nation who was a growing low IQ intake has many problems. No skills to use communications gear. A procurement budget wasted as low IQ troops have a go at a new task and fail and fail. Then fail some more.
    Once supplies are open they have to be used, so low IQ troops use a lot trying to master the most simple mil tasks. Systems that cost nations will small mil budgets millions of $ to work with. Low IQ troops remove all competence in any part of the mil.
    Want a smart useful army that has to use a draft? Dont fill your nation with low IQ people.
    If your nation is full of a generation of low IQ people? Test them to make sure they don't get offered modern mil service.

    --
    Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
  93. Really? All? Or is that just dumb reporting? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    > We're All Getting Dumber, Says Science

    If it's not genes maybe it's environment, specifically the amount of rigor in our news feed. Sloppy language, sloppy thinking, lower scores on IQ tests.

    Not only are we not "all" getting dumber, but "science" didn't say we were. This is a fixable problem. It just takes editors getting smarter. :) Or for most internet media, it means reporters getting smarter, since much internet news is unedited, er, "self-edited", when posted.

  94. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by ooloorie · · Score: 2

    No it's claimed to be that not defined to be that. You can't simply define something to achive a near impossible task and pretend it actually does so.

    Near impossible task? How about a century old statistical technique. Every reasonable IQ test contains g-loadings, and the only thing you can meaningfully compare between IQ tests is the g-factor.

  95. This is by design by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    I believe the elites want a dumber population that easier to control and sell. Glenn Seaborg famous said, "If a foreign government had imposed this system of education on the United States, we would rightly consider it an act of war." But it not a foreign government, the oligarchs within. RESIST - PERSIST. Education yourself!

    "It riles them to believe
    That you perceive
    The web they weave
    And keep on thinking free."
    - Graeme Edge

  96. One possible cause by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Lower quality/standards in education with a higher consumption of information of lower quality = lower test scores.

  97. Smart people in Norway avoiding the military? by Futurepower(R) · · Score: 2

    Exactly.

    "You know, like 90% of all other published research in the psychological sciences." Or maybe 98% of that research is somewhat or mostly wacky?

    Maybe the actual issue: The smart people in Norway are avoiding military service?

    Another subject about Norway:

    Norway is rehabilitative, not destructive, to those who commit crimes. Michael Moore's film, Where to Invade Next explored the system in Norway, and prompted articles like this one: Why Norway's prison system is so successful. Quote from that article: "... when criminals in Norway leave prison, they stay out. It has one of the lowest recidivism rates in the world at 20%. The US has one of the highest: 76.6% of prisoners are re-arrested within five years."

    Being destructive to those who commit crimes is another crime, a crime committed by the government.

    1. Re:Smart people in Norway avoiding the military? by liquid_schwartz · · Score: 1

      Norway is rehabilitative, not destructive, to those who commit crimes. Michael Moore's film, Where to Invade Next explored the system in Norway, and prompted articles like this one: Why Norway's prison system is so successful. Quote from that article: "... when criminals in Norway leave prison, they stay out. It has one of the lowest recidivism rates in the world at 20%. The US has one of the highest: 76.6% of prisoners are re-arrested within five years." Being destructive to those who commit crimes is another crime, a crime committed by the government.

      To be fair Norway doesn't have the massive multicultural issues that the US has. Despite all the cheering for multiculturism it makes life harder in many ways and simply getting along is one of them. US prisons are breeding grounds for gangs, rehabilitation is not really a goal. I'd start over since the current system is so broken that I don't see how incremental reforms could ever change anything. Of course we could start a parallel system for people more likely to be able to be rehabilitated but I'm sure disparate impact would make that illegal. Until disparate impact is dropped a great many changes can never happen.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disparate_impact

    2. Re:Smart people in Norway avoiding the military? by yuriklastalov · · Score: 1

      Don't worry, many European countries are busy "culturally enriching" themselves and will soon get to enjoy the true Multicultural experience. Good luck with that, guys.

    3. Re: Smart people in Norway avoiding the military? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      When I went to the Finnish army in 1988 to do my conscript service, they had us to do the so-called P-test, probably very similar to the Norwegian test. What happened a lot was that people were deliberately acting as dumb as possible in the test to not be chosen later for underofficer or officer training, which meant longer service an having to work harder. I am pretty sure the same happens in Norway, and makes the validity of the data suspect.

    4. Re: Smart people in Norway avoiding the military? by vlad30 · · Score: 1

      Lets see be an officer and order someone to be shot at or be a grunt and be ordered to be shot at. I'd say you dumb if you chose the latter

      --
      Your'e all thinking it, I just said it for you
    5. Re: Smart people in Norway avoiding the military? by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      If you intentionally score low and end up in a wet trench with a rifle, rather than do well on it and getting a cushy number counting blankets, then you deserve to spend your period of service in a wet trench.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    6. Re:Smart people in Norway avoiding the military? by Hognoxious · · Score: 2

      ... when criminals in Norway leave prison, they stay out. It has one of the lowest recidivism rates in the world at 20%.

      That's terrible. How do they stay in business?

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    7. Re: Smart people in Norway avoiding the military? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You missed the part about longer service. Some would choose to have bottom jobs for relativity short amount of time and not not be forced into the military for many, many years.

  98. C*REIMER F.A.Q. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    How_to_defeat_CRE1MER_on_Slashdot!!!
    1)Why-are-people-upset-with-him? 2)What-can-I-do? 3)What-are-his-sockpuppets? 4)Who-is-FatCashewsLovesMe? 5)How-to-defeat-his-hustles 6)Why-are-there-dashes?

    1)Why-are-people-upset-with-himHe makes frequent low quality posts for two reasons:
    Money)BASICALLY: He made thousands of shitty posts and bragged about how much money it made him.
    DETAILS: He wants you to follow his referrer links. He wants you to have his referrer cookie, even if he links to something stupid and promises you that its great and you don't buy it. If you shop on some sites later on and buy other things he'll get a portion of what youve spent. He ALSO tries to drive traffic to various blogs and vlogs that so give him money.
    KarmaHe believes karma accumulates infinitely. So he makes lots of pointless posts that are not bad enough to mod down but maybe you will mod them up if youre trying to use up your mod points. He was a raging ahole for awhile thinking that he had a warchest of karma armor to protect him.

    3)What-can-I-do DOWNMOD you will usually get more mod points, get the oldest posts first you will have plenty of time to get around to the latest ones. Most metamods recognize his name and will not penalize you for modding him down. AC posts by him are usually refilled as well. METAMOD his posts down. REPLY ONLY as ANONYMOUS COWARD and reply only to the most deeply nested comments because this helps hide his posts. Downvote his SUBMISSIONS he has gotten banned for self promotion and also uses submission karma to dodge the mods.

    3)What-are-his-sockpuppets Most famous: CRE1MER CDRE1MER, ILoveFatCashews, Anonymous Cashews, The Fat Bastard
    4)Who-is-FatCashewsLoveMe Mildly annoying. Sort of funny. He works tirelessly to contain cr@imer. Not me. Not cr@imer

    5)How-can-I-avoid-his-hustles DONT FOLLOW HIS LINKS!!!
    IF YOU MUST:Use a private tab and never buy anything on the same session. You can get yourself a part of the commission hed get if you use a cashback shopping portal to buy whatever he spams on amazon, Ill let you pick your own. Or if he fools you just close the tab and clear the cookies for that site. There are other sites other than yutube that will let you watch his videos. I dont know if it even matters but I can picture his jowls jiggling at the though of people subverting his 'business model'
    6)Why-are-there-dashes (and other weird stuff) I know most will only skim these posts and I want the most important information to sink in at a glance. If there is something of interest hopefully you can find it. I also avoid actually using "CRE1MER'S" name because he may think that he gets something from having it indexed by search engines.

    If you feel like spreading the gospel : https://pastebin.com/ZG8TzNLs

    1. Re:C*REIMER F.A.Q. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You have two number 3s?

    2. Re:C*REIMER F.A.Q. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Creimertards are three-year-olds. What did you expect?

    3. Re:C*REIMER F.A.Q. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I expected you to learn that you don't need hyphens for "three year olds", Chris.

    4. Re:C*REIMER F.A.Q. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And grammar nazis!

    5. Re:C*REIMER F.A.Q. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Crammar correctors, Chris. Your teachers gave up on you, I won't.

  99. The only thing we know for sure... by Jason1729 · · Score: 1

    The only thing we know for sure is that the idiotic editors of FastCompany are stupid and getting stupider.

    Aside from the fact that "dumb" refers to speech ability and has nothing to do with IQ...

    this test refers to conscripts in one country's military, it says nothing about the general population. And there is no reason to assume that group reflects society as a whole.
    it is an aggregate test that takes about the average intelligence of its very specific group, nothing about "we're all getting" anything. The group can be getting stupider on average while the smartest are getting smarter
    IQ doesn't even work the way these idiots seem to think it does. It's supposed to be a comparative ranking with current society. There is no way to compare tests taken 30 years ago with tests taken today. If someone in 1970 scored 100 and someone in 2018 scores 110 today, there is no comparison you can legitimately draw between the two.
    And since IQ is a normal distribution against current society, by definition of IQ, IQ of the population is constant.

  100. Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Less crime. No.

    Less people report it because the police and/or courts donâ(TM)t do anything.

    More and more crimes are classified as âoelow priority.â More crimes these days fit a âoecatch and releaseâ profile. More crimes have been decriminalised.

    Itâ(TM)s not good. It is different from the âoeold daysâ but not better. Worse in the long term because crime now is to be âoemanagedâ not dealt with.

    1. Re: Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Shut up with your shit Apple encoded punctuation. It undermines whatever your point in all that was.

    2. Re: Well... by c6gunner · · Score: 1

      Pretty sure his point was "my anecdotes are better than your data because I don't trust your data".

    3. Re: Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Less people report crime because unless the perpetrator is a white male and the victim is not the police won't do anything about it. If the perpetrator is not white then everyone except the perpetrator is racist. If the perpetrator and victim are both non white, to be fair, nobody does anything about it either even in the rare cases it gets reported.

      If the perpetrator is a corporation and the victim is a human, we do nothing about it. If the perpetrator is a middle class or poor human and the victim is a corporation or a rich human, then they get the maximum effect of the law, while a rich human will escape punishment for any crime except taking money from other rich humans.

      The notion of was a crime committed, who did it, and can we identify and catch that person and prove he or she is guilty in a court of law before a jury of peers has gone out the window.

      Fixed that for you. I know it's complicated but that's how it works.

    4. Re: Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Right, this is why 50% of the prison population in the United States is black, even though blacks only comprise 12.5% of the total U.S. population. Because nobody arrests black people.

      Are you insane?

    5. Re: Well... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      TY

  101. Wrong sample by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You have to take out of the sample christians and pedophiles, therefore you will notice te IQ rising

  102. Unbiased? by Ungrounded+Lightning · · Score: 2

    I suggest that you review the definition of the word "Compulsory."

    I suggest that you review the definition of the word "Unbiased." ... the tests are applied to *ALL MALE CITIZENS*. Since this is literally a sample size of "All male citizens of service age in Norway from the start year, to the terminus year", you are talking a very large and unbiased (by ethnicity, race, cultural upbringing, religious practice, affluence level, ... etc.) sample. The only demographic excluded is likely to be female gender, which I explicitly lamplit. Unless you want to make a compelling argument that women are intellectually inferior to men (*gigglesnort*) in the face of a wide number of well reviewed studies to the contrary of that assertion, there is no grounds to claim systemic bias of the sample.

    It's systematically biased by sex.
    It's systematically biased by country of citizenship - which means by race, ethnicity, CHANGES in ethnicity due to immigration, residence, educational system, language, media exposure, diet, political events, disease exposure, environmental stresses (weather, pollution, ...), healthcare system, and I could go on.

    Generalizing from data collected on all draft-age Norwegian males to the state of the entire human race is one of the the kinds of misstep that cause "real scientists" to look down their noses at research work done in the "soft sciences". Did the authors actually make this "all of us" claim, or is it hype hung on their results by the media (or their institution's media relations group)?

    --
    Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
    1. Re:Unbiased? by Bender0x7D1 · · Score: 1

      It's systematically biased by sex. It's systematically biased by country of citizenship - which means by race, ethnicity, CHANGES in ethnicity due to immigration, residence, educational system, language, media exposure, diet, political events, disease exposure, environmental stresses (weather, pollution, ...), healthcare system, and I could go on.

      This strikes me as complaining about a study regarding birds because it doesn't include elephants.

      --
      Reading code is like reading the dictionary - you have to read half of it before you can go back and understand it.
    2. Re: Unbiased? by c6gunner · · Score: 1

      This strikes me as complaining about a study regarding birds because it doesn't include elephants.

      When the headline of the article is "all animals are getting yummier", yes, I would definitely complain if the "study" only included birds.

  103. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    No one is advocating anything, Chris. We are certainly not advocating anyone look at your videos either. BTW, your DMCA game seems a bit weak these days. Maybe it's time to write a blog post called "Why I stopped sending DMCA takedown requests".

  104. High IQ does not make you smart by gweihir · · Score: 1

    That is a lie consistently spread by the IQ measurement community, mostly because they want to sell you something. When you look at actual reality, you find that the IQ is rarely the limiter of what people understand and what not. Much more important is how they chose to use their IQ (usually they do not) and what starting point they chose for chains of reasoning (usually some irrational one they never challenge, randomly copied from the media from peers). With this prevalent mistakes, IQ becomes a minor factor.

    --
    Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
  105. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Slashdot has a very permissive TOS. Don't like it? Complain to the management, bitching about it in the comments achieves nothing.

  106. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Dear internet,
    Today I made another Power Play and stopped annoying Slashdot administration with bad faith DMCA requests.
    That will show those trolls.

  107. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    WARNING: The middle link points to his actual website!!!
    Do not click!

  108. did Norway get their fair share by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Have they received their fair share of Beavis and Butthead, coupled with canned American TV shows?

  109. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It points to another one of his failures.

  110. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    No one is advocating anything, Chris.

    If you weren't advocating copyright infringement, why are you posting a link to a Russian website that is scrapping YouTube channels?

    We are certainly not advocating anyone look at your videos either.

    Funny how a Russian website picked up this particular YouTube channel.

    BTW, your DMCA game seems a bit weak these days.

    You're not advocating copyright infringement but you expect someone to file a DMCA takedown notice for copyright infringement. That doesn't make sense.

    Maybe it's time to write a blog post called "Why I stopped sending DMCA takedown requests".

    Leave a message for creimer on one of his videos. Assuming, of course, he haven't banned you for posting a Nazi comment on last video.

  111. Re: Trump is leading the way. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Emboldened Assholes 2016

  112. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    " why are you posting a link to a Russian website that is scrapping YouTube channels?"

    Is it copyright infringement or "scrapping" [sic] (we know your channel is scrap, Chris).

    "You're not advocating copyright infringement but you expect someone to file a DMCA takedown notice for copyright infringement."

    You're the one calling it copyright infrigement, I expect YOU to file a DMCA takedown notice. That makes sense, unless it isn't copyright infrigement, which is why I can do this:

    https://ua-video.com/c/UC8oH0o...

    And also why your frivolous DMCA takedown notice didn't work.

    " he haven't banned you for posting a Nazi comment on last video."

    Oh so NOW suddenly you know who "creimer" is? Enough to know about his videos and who he banned? LOL you haven't banned anyone you jiggly mental case.

  113. That implies that there ever was a factual time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Coming from the land of Jesus, Wrestling, plastic tits, Disneyland, the "two-party" "representative democracy" and and the American Dream...
    when exactly do you believe that time was?

    How are people supposed to have a chance to grow up into critical thinkers, if they are born into such a society?
    A society where even science is perverted into its absurd opposite, entirely missing the point, with statements such as "I *believe* in science" and "the Church of Science", and most importantly, using the concept of empiricism and "facts" due to the inability to understand, how one can be scientific while accepting that reality is relative and that there is no absolute truth or proof or "facts", when that is half the damn point of the scientific model over religion.

  114. Might wanna check those preconceptions... by denzacar · · Score: 2

    Unless there is something VERY special about Norway, a wide-spread trend that cannot be attributed to education, gender, religion, or other environmental factor has pretty good predictive qualities, since the sample size is large, and unbiased (Only males tested most likely, but the service is compulsory, not voluntary.

    Service in Norway is NOT compulsory.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    About 60,000 Norwegians are available for conscription every year, but only 8,000 to 10,000 are conscripted.[2] In earlier times, up until at least the early 2000s, all men aged 19â"44 were subject to mandatory service, with good reasons required to avoid becoming drafted.

    Besides that decline in conscription, actual numbers of conscripts are around 14% of eligible Norwegian males, cause "the number of applicants each year exceeds the needs of the Armed Forces".

    Further, researchers aren't showing a decline of IQ in Norway, nor anywhere else.
    They are working with a presumption of a decline in IQ and trying to hammer their "observation" peg into that presumed roundish hole.

    Using administrative register data with information on family relationships and cognitive ability for three decades of Norwegian male birth cohorts, we show that the increase, turning point, and decline of the Flynn effect can be recovered from within-family variation in intelligence scores.
    This establishes that the large changes in average cohort intelligence reflect environmental factors and not changing composition of parents, which in turn rules out several prominent hypotheses for retrograde Flynn effects.

    I.e. They claim that they can explain presumed IQ decline by extrapolating measured in-family IQ decline.
    Problem is - they don't actually have the data to show that. And they are blind to their own biases regarding all the preconceptions they are juggling.

    From study's appendix it's pretty obvious that the IQ sample was both changing in structure AND reducing in sample size over the years.
    Number of recruits born between 1964 and 1972 varied between 30440 and 32148.
    1973-1980 we see a drop from 29159 down to 23900.
    1981-1989 rises slowly from 23317 up to 26484.

    But far more important is the fact that they are NOT ACTUALLY FINDING THE IQ DECLINE AMONG THE NORWEGIAN CONSCRIPTS.
    All that they ARE accurately finding is that the number of IQ tests among conscripts has declined by 10 percentage points, over a decade.

    From TFS:

    Conscription test coverage declined substantially for cohorts born after 1980, with coverage rates falling from 93% in 1980 to 83% in 1991 (Fig. 3A).

    So not only is the number of conscripts declining, number of conscripts taking IQ tests has declined even more.
    Which they then take to consideration - and pull the following nonsense out of the thin air.

    Focusing on families with sons in the first two parities and plotting the share of unscored younger siblings by the observed IQ score of the older brother, lower scoring firstborns were more likely to have unscored younger brothers (Fig. 3B).
    The problem is exacerbated toward the end of our data window: Among the 198-1991 birth cohorts, fully 30% of those whose older sibling scored in the bottom IQ bracket have missing IQ scores.
    As sibling scores are correlated, this implies that low-ability males are less likely to be scored, and that the selection was stronger for the cohorts born in the late 1980s than for those from the 1960s and 1970s.

    I.e. Not only are they ASSUMING correlation between IQs of sibli

    --
    Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
  115. Well selective pressure is down. by Maxo-Texas · · Score: 1

    You have to admit, humans faced much stronger selective pressure in the past.

    The people I know who have the most kids are too dumb to use birth control reliably.

    The smart people I know (genius level) have 1 or 0 children.

    It could be a fluke of data... or yea.. dumb people might be becoming a larger portion of the population.

    --
    She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
  116. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That makes sense, unless it isn't copyright infrigement, which is why I can do this:

    The legal term is contributory copyright infringement.

    And also why your frivolous DMCA takedown notice didn't work.

    You're making the assumption that a DMCA takedown notice got issued. Is creimer on record that he issued an DMCA takedown notice for this URL?

    Enough to know about his videos and who he banned?

    You were complaining in a previous comment from a few days ago that creimer deleted your Nazi comment from his recent video.

  117. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "The legal term is contributory copyright infringement [wikipedia.org]."

    In the USA. Not Russia! Go complain to NATO, the UN, UNESCO, the Army, Navy, Air Force, Pentagon, Congress, Senate, White House, FBI, CIA, NSA, Homeland Security, local Sheriff's office, mall security, The Grove's janitor, and that guy you chatted up waiting for the 25 last week.

    They won't care either.

    "You're making the assumption that a DMCA takedown notice got issued."

    You're assuming that's what I assumed. If you didn't issue a DMCA notice, then it's not copyright infringement, right?

    "Is creimer on record "

    Whoever (or whatever) that is.

    "You were complaining in a previous comment from a few days ago that creimer deleted your Nazi comment from his recent video."

    By assuming every AC is the same person, you make yourself extremely trollable to every AC.

    (Do you like how I use the same odd wording you use?)

  118. Getting dumber by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Evolution can go in more than one direction.

  119. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Yes, Chris. Now fuck off.

  120. Science reporting is getting dumber by guruevi · · Score: 1

    The data and abstract doesn't show what is claimed in the headline. It shows a slowdown of the Flynn effect but the people in the studies are still smarter than 1970s cohorts.

    What's more is that the data clearly declares bias: only Norwegian males born from two Norwegian parents are included. Moreover the scoring systems were changed in the 1980s and in the early 2000s and they indicate the data is thus less accurate.

    So basically: people entering the Norwegian military are not getting progressively smarter as we thought. Or: people that aren't smart enough to avoid military service are getting dumber.

    --
    Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
  121. Duh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    smart people are focusing on their careers instead of having kids, and work and educational "opportunity" punish family life. The future belongs to those who show up for it.

  122. Calculators, Wordprocessors, and Smartphones by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    First drop in IQ was when calculators were cheap enough to be used by students instead of a slide rule.
    Next drop in IQ occurs when home computers replaced typewriters. No longer do you have to type carefully or learn to spell.
    Next drop in IQ is the removable of cash from our society. No longer do you have to do basic arithmetic to buy something.
    And the most recent drop in IQ is the use of smartphones to beam in a constant stream of online drivel into a child's brain.

    In the future we won't be learning penmanship in schools. Already basic cursive writing is unknown to our youngest generation. We have underestimated the influence on development that the physical act of writing has. Having to repetitively practice movements in order to communicate the written word established structures in the brain that are built upon for a lifetime.

  123. Speak For Yourself! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'm getting smarter every day!

  124. The hard truth by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The browning of 1st world.

    If you let in populations that have IQ around 70-90, then no wonder.

  125. CRIMER FAQ v2.0 W/ guest editor TARDCHRIS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ###How to defeat CRIMER on Slashdot### 1)Why-are-people-upset-with-him? 2)What-can-I-do 3)What-are-his-names 4)Who-is-FatCashewsLovesMe 5)How-to-defeat-his-hustles 6)Why-are-there-dashes 7)Pastebin-Copy

    1)Why-are-people-upset-with-himHe makes frequent low quality posts for two reasons:
    Money) BASICALLY: He made thousands of shitty posts & bragged about how much money it made him.
    DETAILS: He wants u to folow his referer links & pick up his cookie. Even if u dont buy what he linked but do buy something else from that site later on he often makes money;He ALSO tries to drive TRAFFIC to his various BLOGS & vlogs.
    Karma)He believes karma acumulates infinitely So he makes lots of pointles posts that r not bad enough to mod down;hoping they wil get moded up;He was a raging ahole when he thoght he had a surplus of karma

    2)What-can-I-do DOWNMOD u wil usually get more mod points. If he is postng from a new sock acount w/ krma, get his oldst posts first. DOWNMOD him and AC in fresh thrads early on;Metmods wil reward u. METAMOD his posts. REPLY ONLY ANONYMOUSLY to the most deeply nested coments in his threds it helps hide his posts. Dwnvote his SUBMISSIONS, he uses to get krma. REPORT HIM to slshdot & the afiliate progrms he is usng. DONT MENTION his brand names c**mer.

    3)What-are-his-namesMost famous:Cre|mer Cdre|mer ILoveFatCashews, Anonymous Cashews, The Fat Bastard aka TCDR
    4)Who-is-FatCashewsLoveMe AKA Tardu Lardo,FCLM Funny & anoying; Not me or crimer;He keeps lookout for infestation

    5)How-can-I-avoid-his-hustles --===DONT FOLLOW HIS LINKS!!!===--
    IF YOU MUST:Use a privte tab & nevr buy anything on the same sesion. U can get urself a part of the comision hed get if u use a cashbak shoping portal to buy whatevr he spams on amzon. If he fools u, close tab, cler the cookies for that site. There r sites other than yutube that wil let u watch his videos. I dont know if people view his contnt but I can pictre his jowls jigling at the thoght of people subvrting his business model
    6)Why-are-there-dashes & weird stuffI know most only skim thse posts. I want the most imprtnt infrmton to pop out at a glnce & to keep it shrt. I dont use TCDRs name becase he may think tht he benfits from geting it indxed by serch engnes. Id like 2 thnk TCDR & FCLM for editrial advice 7)https://pastebin.com/cFj4B7Tq

  126. PAY OFF YOUR CREDIT CARDS TARDCHRIS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    _,.- --=#How to defeat CRIMER on Slashdot#=-- -.,_ 1)Why-are-people-upset-with-him? 2)What-can-I-do 3)What-are-his-names 4)Who-is-FatCashewsLovesMe 5)How-to-defeat-his-hustles 6)Why-are-there-dashes 7)Pastebin-Copy

    1)Why-are-people-upset-with-himHe makes frequent low quality posts for two reasons:
    Money) BASICALLY: He made thousands of shitty posts & bragged about how much money it made him.
    DETAILS: He wants u to folow his referer links & pick up his cookie. Even if u dont buy what he linked but do buy something else from that site later on he often makes money;He ALSO tries to drive TRAFFIC to his various BLOGS & vlogs.
    Karma)He believes karma acumulates infinitely So he makes lots of pointles posts that r not bad enough to mod down;hoping they wil get moded up;He was a raging ahole when he thoght he had a surplus of karma

    2)What-can-I-do DOWNMOD u wil usually get more mod points. If he is postng from a new sock acount w/ krma, get his oldst posts first. DOWNMOD him and AC in fresh thrads early on;Metmods wil reward u. METAMOD his posts. REPLY ONLY ANONYMOUSLY to the most deeply nested coments in his threds it helps hide his posts. Dwnvote his SUBMISSIONS, he uses to get krma. REPORT HIM to slshdot & the afiliate progrms he is usng. DONT MENTION his brand names c**mer.

    3)What-are-his-namesMost famous:Cre|mer Cdre|mer ILoveFatCashews, Anonymous Cashews, The Fat Bastard aka TCDR
    4)Who-is-FatCashewsLoveMe AKA Tardu Lardo,FCLM Funny & anoying; Not me or crimer;He keeps lookout for infestation

    5)How-can-I-avoid-his-hustles --===DONT FOLLOW HIS LINKS!!!===--
    IF YOU MUST:Use a privte tab & nevr buy anything on the same sesion. U can get urself a part of the comision hed get if u use a cashbak shoping portal to buy whatevr he spams on amzon. If he fools u, close tab, cler the cookies for that site. There r sites other than yutube that wil let u watch his videos. I dont know if people view his contnt but I can pictre his jowls jigling at the thoght of people subvrting his business model
    6)Why-are-there-dashes & weird stuffI know most only skim thse posts. I want the most imprtnt infrmton to pop out at a glnce & to keep it shrt. I dont use TCDRs name becase he may think tht he benfits from geting it indxed by serch engnes. Id like 2 thank TardChrisDR & FCLM for editral advce7)http://pastebin.com/cFj4B7Tq

  127. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "Is creimer on record that he issued an DMCA takedown notice for this URL?"

    Yes.

    "Your mistake was assuming that creimer would only send a DMCA takedown notice for copyright infringement to the Russian website."

    You flat-headed obese mongoloid virgin Sasquatch.

  128. Norwegian Conscription by del_diablo · · Score: 1

    But the reason we are here in this topic, is because Norway used to have mandatory conscription screening, which did produce a lot of statistics about its population.

    In the age group of 18, there is roughly 70.000 each year. Since conscription is unisex these days, even if its a 2/3 male/female split. So 17.000 of those gets called in for all the tests: Physical, aptitude, perception, mental ability. So the sad part is that we don't test the other 53.000. And another thing is that statistics will skew as the total amount of boys tested will go down. But since this is a national endeavor, the statistical skew will affect the more populated areas a lot more than any rural region, and Norway has a lot of rural regions.
    So past that, Norway wants about 9000 conscripts, conscripting what it can.

    And there is a lot surrounding this. Screen has been gradually reduced, alongside smaller number of conscripts.
    In 2012, Civil Service was removed. This used to apply to people with the aptitude, but with clashing moral reasons to serve the army.
    In the early 2000s, a change was made to stop doing the interview screening process with the local police, and instead went for a online form.
    Somewhere in the 1990s, the amount of conscript was reduced, but not the extensive screening process. This is what happens when Soviet Russia collapses into something lesser.
    1977, women where allowed to enter all parts of the army, assuming they passed physical screening.
    This is also a topic where its hard to google for information, since very few newspaper articles will publish the line of historical events.

  129. Iodine by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's because there is much less Iodine in the diet. Dairies used to use iodine based disinfectant but that has been discontinued.

  130. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Nobody likes you, Chris.

    "I never got this kind of shit on Reddit."

    Then fuck off right back to Reddit. Why you insist on posting on a website you claim no one heard about is mystifying. Then again, everything you do is puzzling. Your eBooks no one reads, your certifications you never get, your videos no one watches.

    https://www.reddit.com/search?...

    There is no such user as "The Fat Bastard" on Reddit. So who never got this kind of shit on Reddit? Which mysterious and totally unknown person could it be? Could it be George Lucas? Could it be a Snuffleupagus?

    Or maybe it was a pig.

    Or maybe you're Christopher Dale Reimer?

  131. The IQ of the world is a constant by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The IQ of the world is a constant.

    The population is increasing.

    Stop having so many kids!

  132. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The Harry Potter books sold ~1 million in Norwegian

    Eureka! You have stumbled upon a really good reason for declining intelligence: Shitty literature!

  133. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Chris, my team has just updated me with your new contact info. It is nice to hear from you again and to see that you have managed to get a new Slashdot account.

    *** Chris, contact me ASAP please. I have AI click bots that don't get detected by youtube algorythm! :) -2 subscribers and 10 views a day for you is sad.. -love granny XX ***

    Dear Team Creimer,

    I just noticed that the Humpty-Dumpty video has 435+ millions views, that should make you salivate!

    I have plenty of ideas to make the views on your own youtube channel skyrocket but you didn't contact me yet. Is it because I am a lady? Ethell says that you are sexist but I hope it isn't true.

    Anyway, I will give you a free hint anyway: Dress-up as Humpty in your videos, you shouldn't need that much makeup making this a money saving situation in your own case.

    My YouTube channel has 222K subscribers and many videos with hundreds of thousands of views:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

    Now, with some slight adjustments, I think that together, we could make the view count skyrocket on your very own Team Creimer youtube channel :)

    Please feel confident to contact me if you want me to coach you, we aren't living so far away from each other so we could even easily meet.

    Love XX,

    --
    -Granny

  134. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Then, why don't you limit your activity to reddit?

    Meanwhile (since creimer amazingly seems to be able to understand that word), the creimy-dumpty video gets 1,000,000 views every single day due to creimer.

    See the famous 1,000,000 views a day creimy-dumpty video here:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

  135. Re: Trump is leading the way. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Most definitely. They thought their girl had it won. Were incredibly smug, condescending, elitist assholes. Got everything they deserved.

  136. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    +1 hilarious! Even the king's horses don't know what to do and seem puzzled with creimer! They seem to be asking themselves; How can't he learn?

    Very funny! It is like watching creimer stumble over and over again!

  137. Link to the paper. (Via Sci-Hub.) by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    http://sci-hub.tw/http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2018/06/05/1718793115

    Fuck the money-stealing non-working Content Mafia leeches!

  138. No kdding. YouTube banned me by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I usually only make informative posts on YouTube and similar outlets yet I get banned from nearly all of them for spreading accurate information that "normal" people don't agree with. These systems are DESIGNED to make us stupid.

  139. People are getting dumber with each generation. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    We are living out the scenario illustrated in the movie Idiocracy.

  140. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Here are some posts from creimer's old account that was blocked and renamed by Slashdot management. I'll start with his love of child brides.

    If all my assets were liquidated, I would still have enough cash to buy a new car and head off to Mexico to find a chica to marry.
    https://slashdot.org/comments....

    You're aware that are some states in the U.S. that allow underage marriage as young as 14 years old?
    https://slashdot.org/comments....
    As for my comment, I've heard stories of engineers retiring at 50, moving to Mexico and marrying underage girls. Since I work with ex-military, the Philippines is a popular retirement spot for marrying underage girls as well. It's all about getting the most bang for your retirement dollars.
    https://slashdot.org/comments....
    That only works if you retire to Mexico, build a mansion (by local standards), marry an underage sweet thing and bequeath all your possessions to the village.
    https://slashdot.org/comments....

    You need to be more specific. I wrote 3,000+ comments this year.
    https://slashdot.org/comments....

    Nah... I just do it to piss off my trolls and make coffee money off of them.
    https://slashdot.org/comments....
    We have different priorities. You want to climb the corporate ladder. I want to own the corporate ladder.
    https://slashdot.org/comments....

    Your bitch licks your balls. Most people don't brag about practicing bestiality. Is there a reason why you married a dog and not a goat?
    https://slashdot.org/comments....

    My employers don't care about what my Slashdot trolls think. Now go off and lick your balls somewhere else.
    https://slashdot.org/comments....
    iPhone 6s and reduce my monthly bill from $80 to $50. As a phone and a video camera, the iPhone 6s isn't obsolete. As a Sprint customer for 20+ years, Sprint will always offer me a new iPhone if I decide to stop using the 6s as a phone in the next several years.
    https://slashdot.org/comments....
    Miracle workers are never afraid to ask for a second opinion. Supervisor gave me his opinion ? and a mess to clean up. Lesson learned from this incident: if something isn't quite broken, break it.
    https://slashdot.org/comments....

    So you can turn around call me a liar again? People have been playing that game with me for years.
    https://slashdot.org/comments....
    Based on what I've read about Uber, he need to tell the boys to clean up their locker room behavior, zip up their pants, and attend sensitivity training until everyone agrees that women are not sexual objects.
    https://slashdot.org/comments....

    Which doesn't violate the Slashdot TOS. If you got a problem with that, take it up with management.
    https://slashdot.org/comments....
    This year I've posted ~4,000 comments.
    https://slashdot.org/comments....

    I don't bother with mod points. I'm doing something much more sinister. It took te

  141. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That's true enough!

    Creimer came in my cubicle the other day around 1:30 PM to fix my Ethernet connectivity. He had to crawl under my desk to reach the cable and oh my god! While crawling under the desk, he released an unbelievable amount of gas and the whole floor had to be evacuated for the rest of the day.

    An HAZMAT team was requested to approve the condition before we could go in again the next day and entrance was delayed until 10:45 AM.

    3 workers with chronical respiratory problems had to go to the hospital and 1 is still in critical state.

    Update:
    This is NOT a fart joke!
    https://slashdot.org/comments....
    The gas seemed to come out of his ears. My guess is that gas accumulates in his large empty head:
    http://ibb.co/mRVSaG

  142. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That's true Chris.

    Unfortunately you get nothing, well you get 7 youtube subscribers :)

    Slashdot gets it all in additional advertisement revenue streams.

    Keep on the good work!

    Thanks Chris,

    --
    BeauHD

  143. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    CROFLOL! See creimer mental abilities here:
    https://groups.google.com/foru...

    Read what Chris Reimer (cdreimer) wrote here:
    https://groups.google.com/foru...

    You are such a perfect miracle imbecile Chris!

    I can't believe that you are actually imbecile enough to post this thread here. It makes you look like an even more imbecile fucktard yet.

    As some have stated on that thread "dot is NOT an operator", you fucktard! Apperently, you did not read the thread yourself or more likely, your ameba brain reading comprehension doesn't allow you to understand its content.

    It's like asking: What is the dot operator precedence in Linux Slackware 1.2.3? You can't daisy chain dot operators in Windows versions (e.g. 3.1, 3.11, etc.)

    What is the precedence in the 2.5 IQ that you possess?

    And if you ever asked about real operators the word is "Precedence" you fucktard!

    Dots are not operators in ANY OOP language you silly fuck!

    See java:
    https://docs.oracle.com/javase...

    For python, you could have googled it but no, you needed to grab the attention on that google group and didn't care that it made you look like a total fool.
    http://reeborg.ca/docs/oop_py_...

    See example in above link:
    Fido.head.mouth.teeth.canine.hurts();
    Other example:
    Criemer.head.brain.isHurting(); This is always false because your head is empty you dumb fuck!

    But Criemer.head.isEmpty() always returns true...

  144. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What a pest! In the end, he managed to get regular contributors on that google group arguing between each other about irrelevant matters and mess up things like he always do!

  145. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Thanks creimer!

    I have been watching you for a while and you are so transparent that anybody can see right through you.

    In short, you just confirmed that I scored a point here.

  146. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Come on man! Be nice, just a little more on the SJW side without being one.

    There was never any game, creimer lost by default before the game even started due to his mental abilities and general approach to problem solving.

  147. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    After creimer repetitively made fun of POTUS on line, he now goes after aliens on his youtube channel.

    No target seems big enough for creimer, maybe because nothing matches creimer size.

    What a dumb fat bastard!
    --
    Robert Bigelow
    Founder and President
    Bigelow Aerospace

  148. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    creimer left slashdot for youtube months ago but his channel only gets 4 views a day and 1 comment a month so this doesn't quite satisfy creimer's need for attention which is as big as his appetite.

    So, he keeps opening suck puppet accounts on Slashdot in order to get some kind of attention.

  149. They are getting dumber because... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ..They hide all their research behind a paywall.

  150. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Chris' case is getting worse, he spends all day replying to himself as AC on /. and now, on YouTube in order to grab attention!

    The tests we ran on Chris have shown that Chris has the intelligence of an ameba:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    So, technically, he is able to conceive some kind of agenda but it will be silly or impossible to follow on a human scale.

    For example, Chris had an agenda to post anything he felt like on Slashdot which did not work well because it was based on his false beliefs that he had an infinite number of karma points as he wrote here several times.

    Several people here explained to Chris that karma maxed out at some level like 50 or so but Chris kept on insisting that his python script had confirmed that he had millions of karma points!

    Oh well, as I wrote before: "It isn't Chris' fault if he is the way he is. We do the best we can do with him and he is partially integrated into society. We try to cure his abnormal need for attention but he is kind of stubborn and won't listen to anybody."

    For the valuable /. users that might already have read the following, please note that there is an important update.

    IMPORTANT UPDATE:
    Special Education for the Santa Clara County Office of Education has invested money to buy Chris a new chair:
    http://www.keynamics.com/image...

    Information about Christopher Dale Reimer and autistic people:

    Autistic people have obsessions about things normal people don't care. For example, one of our autistic patient went haywire when he realized that there was a penny missing in his pocket change.

    To calm him down, one of our educator pretended to have found it on the floor and gave a penny to him.

    The autistic patient condition went even worse because he realized it wasn't the same penny!

    Chris has an obsession with budgeting every penny. He doesn't understand that most people do not budget to the penny and have a flexible amount they allow for miscellaneous items.

    I am Nancy Guerrero and I am Director of Special Education for the Santa Clara County Office of Education. We use Chris' (a.k.a. creimer,cdreimer) picture in our document because he is the hardest case we have ever had to handle:
    http://www.sccoe.org/depts/stu...

    Our artists were inspired by the low carb diet that Christopher follows scrupulously for the small lunch box and by the picture linked below for the rest. I am sure that you will notice the similarities such as the bump on the side of his chest and more:
    https://ibb.co/gVad65

    Please be easy on Christopher although, I am aware that some of our staff handling Chris post joke comments here and obvoiusly, the Santa Clara County Office of Education disapprove that behavior vehemently:
    http://ibb.co/mRVSaG

    But it isn't Chris' fault if he is the way he is. We do the best we can do with him and he is partially integrated into society. We try to cure his abnormal need for attention but he is kind of stubborn and won't listen to anybody.

    Thank You dear users,
    ---
    Nancy Guerrero
    Director
    Special Education
    Santa Clara County Office of Education

  151. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Exactly Nancy,

    It seems like Chris is a victim here. He keeps on reading those SEO, youtube algorithm, basically get rich quick sites. He doesn't realize that he is the fish for them since they make money off him with their own schemes. Then, he wastes his time trying to implement what those sites suggest and he ends up disturbing people.

    I mean, those crooks tell Chris that he has to build personal brands and he goes on the Internet and makes everything about himself public!

    I believe we should bring this up at our next meeting. He might not be our only patient victim of such on-line abuse.

    --
    Silvia Bunge
    Psychology Department
    University of California, Berkeley

  152. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Wow creimer!

    I know that you only own fresh water tanks. You would be too dumb to read a copper test anyway.

    But seriously, who taught you that one, it is only known by a few members of my select salt water tank club?

    POFL = Puffing On Floor Laughing

    https://simple.wikipedia.org/w...

    Perfectly suited in your case!

    P.S. we have a puffer con in L.A. next May and we still have some room for affiliates...

  153. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Also, I have updated my sig yet one more time! I am now selling vacuum cleaners, going door to door while picking up second-hand lottery tickets at the same time!

    Now, talk about efficiency! We will see who gets the last laugh when I collect all those royalties.

  154. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    creimer is an amazing miracle poster!

    I had never seen a minus 3 post on slashdot before. Only creimer could manage to do it!

    See here:
    https://slashdot.org/comments....

  155. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    creimer is already busy with too many affiliate link programs.

    creimer would accept the mascot position although if pay is more than 5$ an hour, which is much more than creimer does collecting second hand lottery tickets.

    creimer would save the puffer con with costume charge and creimer would look more like a puffer than this guy:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

    As long as creimer can still collect second hand lottery tickets while acting as mascot you got deal.

  156. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Creimer, not a "normal" sf&f cunt!

    Chris, why did you delete my comment from your great video page?

    I already told you about this, go figure why you have no comments on your channel and why people never come back!

    You get 4 views a day total for 50+ videos so, not even 0.1 average view by video and you delete comments as they come in you dumb fat bastard.

  157. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Holy shit man!

    I told the fat fucker that youtube was much smarter than slashdot in dealing with spammers that bring no value but as usual, the bastard doesn't listen to anybody but himself!

    Oh well, I believe creimer youtube adventure is coming to an end soon...

  158. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Team creimer wants to believe. Never underestimate the power of believing. We will see who gets the last laugh you creimertard.

  159. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I have noted that Chris uses child psychology to convince his so called trolls to give up by pretending they just give him free publicity. That's adoring! ;-)

    Anyway Chris would have a hard time to learn anything above child level matters, including psychology.

    https://childdevelopmentinfo.c...

    ---
    Silvia Bunge
    Psychology Department
    University of California, Berkeley

  160. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by avandesande · · Score: 1

    Exactly! I have boosted my intelligence by not reading.

    --
    love is just extroverted narcissism
  161. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Wow Chris! :)

    Look at all the free attention you're getting!

    Now, you must find a way to moneytize that great potential into long tail revenue streams!

  162. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Creimertards will "think" you are creimer...

    Nope Chris!

    Most Creimertards think "football player". I do anyway.

  163. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    hahaha me in china and me pipi in your latte and caca in cliff bars you buy amazon.

    you: The Fat Bastard Retard

    all china know you account:
    https://slashdot.org/~The+Fat+...

    all china know you video:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

    all china know you caca youtube chanel but no link.

    china the best

  164. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Wow, what a day!

    At last somebody with the same grammatical level as creimer. Perfect candidate to chat with creimer.

    I hope you guys can become buddies Chris!

  165. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Dear mister Reimer,

    I was expecting a new video on Friday and I have been waiting for it all week.

    Also, when are you finally release the results of your YouTube poll about people in favor of a 2 to 3 weeks government shutdown?

    I am seriously considering unsubscribing from your YouTube channel.

    -an humble subscriber.

    P.S. I made the same comment on your youtube channel but you deleted it again as usual.

  166. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by serviscope_minor · · Score: 1

    Near impossible task? How about a century old statistical technique.

    Hoe about it? It's not a measure of mental performance that's independent of either domain or education. It's one incomplete attempt to summarise a multi-axis distrbution with a single number.

    So yes, boiling down intelligence to a single number is basicaly bullshit.

    Every reasonable IQ test contains g-loadings,

    IQ tests are particular bullshit because they test a very small and specific set of thigs.

    --
    SJW n. One who posts facts.
  167. Carl Sagan by zifn4b · · Score: 1

    This isn't news. Carl Sagan was gravely concerned about this.

    --
    We'll make great pets
  168. Fox News by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    How many of the participants watch Fox News and/or Infowars? Those people could be throwing the curve.

  169. today's good films by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    In the olden days it was 99% garbage and 1% quality, now it's 100% garbage. Where are today's films that compare to the golden age of cinema?

    For your consideration:

    * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academy_Awards#Current_categories
    * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toronto_International_Film_Festival_People%27s_Choice_Award

  170. It's true. by MerlTurkin · · Score: 1

    Some schools are even doing away with homework. Can you fucking IMAGINE??? Lazy kids, stupid parents.

  171. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

    IQ tests measure education, not intelligence.

    It might appear that way to people who don't have much of either.

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  172. Re:IQ does not measure intelligence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    So yes, boiling down intelligence to a single number is basicaly bullshit.

    It practically writes itself.

  173. I think... by Stubbyfingers · · Score: 1

    We have become TOO reliant upon technology to shift the "busy work" of our thinking.

    Calculators. Devices to remind us of appointments. Google maps to navigate.

  174. Wait... doesnâ(TM)t IQ not work like this? by Hentai007 · · Score: 1

    If the points dropped across the board by around 7 points wouldnâ(TM)t the scores people receive be around the same? Since itâ(TM)s just based on an average?

  175. What's the opposite of the Flynn Effect? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    My vote goes for the Trump effect.

  176. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Let me see if I understand correctly, Chris. You claim not to know who creimer is, but you want us to believe you have a case of creimertards? If you don't know who creimer is, how do you know what creimertards are?

    Seems to me you're the tard.

  177. Raspberry by Doctrinsograce · · Score: 1

    Science says we are all getting dumber? Well, all I can say to that is Pffffffffffffffffffffffffftttttttttt

  178. Dumb is the idea itself by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    IQ scores measure intelligence? I've got a bridge to sell you.

  179. IQ Test is the Problem by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I thought the IQ test was only valid on children as it essentially measures precociousness.

    So, maybe the findings have more to do with the test and the age of the people to whom it is being administered?

  180. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I just love how creimertards think that no one can see into their little bubble and reads at -1 on Slashdot.

    You should be flattered that The Fat Bastard acknowledged your pressence after ignoring you for so long.

    Did you enjoy going apeshit all over Slashdot this weekend?

  181. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 1

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  182. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The pastebins got removed for contributory copyright infringment. Tsk, tsk.

  183. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Contribute THIS

    https://ua-video.com/c/UC8oH0o...

    fat man!

  184. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    C.D. Reimer is reinventing himself on UA-video.

    Do it yourself since you set this account up, FCLM. If the Russian website was scraping from the YouTube website, it wouldn't have altered the bio text.

  185. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Is FCLM on record that he set up this account?

    " it wouldn't have altered the bio text."

    You think the Russians influenced the elections, but they can't run a grep in a script?

    Does your skull ever get tired of doing your rectum's job?

  186. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I can only imagine yours when you see this

    https://ua-video.com/c/UC8oH0o...

    LOL, you caught the attention of Ivan!!!

    CROFL

    The above comment was posted by FCLM. Whenever someone posts a link to a Russian website, it's never by coincidence. Curious that the comment still appears in FCLM comment history but not in the actual thread.

    We can't find a comment with that ID (56675300) in this discussion (12152608).

    A deleted comment on Slashdot. Who knew?

  187. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 1

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  188. CRIMER FAQ v2.0!!!!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ###How to protect Slashdot from CRIMER### 1)Why-are-people-upset-with-him? 2)What-can-I-do 3)What-are-his-names 4)Who-is-FatCashewsLovesMe 5)How-to-defeat-his-hustles 6)Why-are-there-dashes 7)Pastebin-Copy

    1)Why-are-people-upset-with-himHe makes frequent low quality posts for two reasons:
    Money) BASICALLY: He made thousands of shitty posts & bragged about how much money it made him.
    DETAILS: He wants u to folow his referer links & pick up his cookie. Even if u dont buy what he linked but do buy something else from that site later on he often makes money;He ALSO tries to drive TRAFFIC to his various BLOGS & vlogs.
    Karma)He believes karma acumulates infinitely So he makes lots of pointles posts that r not bad enough to mod down;hoping they wil get moded up;He was a raging ahole when he thoght he had a surplus of karma

    2)What-can-I-do DOWNMOD u wil usually get more mod points. If he is postng from a new sock acount w/ krma, get his oldst posts first. DOWNMOD him and AC in fresh thrads early on;Metmods wil reward u. METAMOD his posts. REPLY ONLY ANONYMOUSLY to the most deeply nested coments in his threds it helps hide his posts. Dwnvote his SUBMISSIONS, he uses to get krma. REPORT HIM to slshdot & the afiliate progrms he is usng. DONT MENTION his brand names c**mer.

    3)What-are-his-namesMost famous:Cre|mer Cdre|mer ILoveFatCashews, Anonymous Cashews, The Fat Bastard aka TCDR
    4)Who-is-FatCashewsLoveMe AKA Tardu Lardo,FCLM Funny & anoying; Not me or crimer;He keeps lookout for infestation

    5)How-can-I-avoid-his-hustles ===DONT FOLLOW HIS LINKS!!!===
    IF YOU MUST:Use a privte tab & nevr buy anything on the same sesion. U can get urself a part of the comision hed get if u use a cashbak shoping portal to buy whatevr he spams on amzon. If he fools u, close tab, cler the cookies for that site. There r sites other than yutube that wil let u watch his videos. I dont know if people view his contnt but I can pictre his jowls jigling at the thoght of people subvrting his business model
    6)Why-are-there-dashes & weird stuffI know most only skim thse posts. I want the most imprtnt infrmton to pop out at a glnce & to keep it shrt. I dont use TCDRs name becase he may think tht he benfits from geting it indxed by serch engnes. Id like 2 thnk TCDR & FCLM for editrial advice 7)Copy: http://archive.is/TtDrY

  189. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    _,--=#[How to protect Slashdot from CRIMER]#=--,_ 1)Why-are-people-upset-with-him? 2)What-can-I-do 3)What-are-his-names 4)Who-is-FatCashewsLovesMe 5)How-to-defeat-his-hustles 6)Why-are-there-dashes 7)Pastebin-Copy

    1)Why-are-people-upset-with-himHe makes frequent low quality posts for two reasons:
    Money) BASICALLY: He made thousands of shitty posts & bragged about how much money it made him.
    DETAILS: He wants u to folow his referer links & pick up his cookie. Even if u dont buy what he linked but do buy something else from that site later on he often makes money;He ALSO tries to drive TRAFFIC to his various BLOGS & vlogs.
    Karma)He believes karma acumulates infinitely So he makes lots of pointles posts that r not bad enough to mod down;hoping they wil get moded up;He was a raging ahole when he thoght he had a surplus of karma

    2)What-can-I-do DOWNMOD u wil usually get more mod points. If he is postng from a new sock acount w/ krma, get his oldst posts first. DOWNMOD him and AC in fresh thrads early on;Metmods wil reward u. METAMOD his posts. REPLY ONLY ANONYMOUSLY to the most deeply nested coments in his threds it helps hide his posts. Dwnvote his SUBMISSIONS, he uses to get krma. REPORT HIM to slshdot & the afiliate progrms he is usng. DONT MENTION his brand names c**mer.

    3)What-are-his-namesMost famous:Cre|mer Cdre|mer ILoveFatCashews, Anonymous Cashews, The Fat Bastard aka TCDR
    4)Who-is-FatCashewsLoveMe AKA Tardu Lardo,FCLM Funny & anoying; Not me or crimer;He keeps lookout for infestation

    5)How-can-I-avoid-his-hustles - --==DONT FOLLOW HIS LINKS!!!==-- -
    IF YOU MUST:Use a privte tab & nevr buy anything on the same sesion. If he fools u, close tab, cler the cookies for that site. There r sites other than yutube that wil let u watch his videos. I dont know if people view his contnt but I can pictre his jowls jigling at the thoght of people subvrting his business model
    6)Why-are-there-dashes & weird stuffI know most only skim thse posts. I want the most imprtnt infrmton to pop out at a glnce & to keep it shrt. I dont use TCDRs name becase he may think tht he benfits from geting it indxed by serch engnes. Id like 2 thnk TCDR & FCLM for editrial advice 7)Copy: http://archive.is/TtDrY

  190. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    _,--=#[How to protect Slashdot from CRIMER]#=--,_ 1)Why-are-people-upset-with-him? 2)What-can-I-do 3)What-are-his-names 4)Who-is-FatCashewsLovesMe 5)How-to-defeat-his-hustles 6)Why-are-there-dashes 7)Pastebin-Copy

    1)Why-are-people-upset-with-himHe makes frequent low quality posts for two reasons:
    Money) BASICALLY: He made thousands of shitty posts & bragged about how much money it made him.
    DETAILS: He wants u to folow his referer links & pick up his cookie. Even if u dont buy what he linked but do buy something else from that site later on he often makes money;He ALSO tries to drive TRAFFIC to his various BLOGS & vlogs.
    Karma)He believes karma acumulates infinitely So he makes lots of pointles posts that r not bad enough to mod down;hoping they wil get moded up;He was a raging ahole when he thoght he had a surplus of karma

    2)What-can-I-do DOWNMOD u wil usually get more mod points. If he is postng from a new sock acount w/ krma, get his oldst posts first. DOWNMOD him and AC in fresh thrads early on;Metmods wil reward u. METAMOD his posts. REPLY ONLY ANONYMOUSLY to the most deeply nested coments in his threds it helps hide his posts. Dwnvote his SUBMISSIONS, he uses to get krma. REPORT HIM to slshdot & the afiliate progrms he is usng. DONT MENTION his brand names c**mer.

    3)What-are-his-namesMost famous:Cre|mer Cdre|mer ILoveFatCashews, Anonymous Cashews, The Fat Bastard aka TCDR
    4)Who-is-FatCashewsLoveMe AKA Tardu Lardo,FCLM Funny & anoying; Not me or crimer;He keeps lookout for infestation

    5)How-can-I-avoid-his-hustles ===DONT FOLLOW HIS LINKS!!!===
    IF YOU MUST:Use a privte tab & nevr buy anything on the same sesion. U can get urself a part of the comision hed get if u use a cashbak shoping portal to buy whatevr he spams on amzon. If he fools u, close tab, cler the cookies for that site. There r sites other than yutube that wil let u watch his videos. I dont know if people view his contnt but I can pictre his jowls jigling at the thoght of people subvrting his business model
    6)Why-are-there-dashes & weird stuffI know most only skim thse posts. I want the most imprtnt infrmton to pop out at a glnce & to keep it shrt. I dont use TCDRs name becase he may think tht he benfits from geting it indxed by serch engnes. Id like 2 thnk TCDR & FCLM for editrial advice 7)Mirror: http://archive.is/TtDrY

  191. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "A deleted comment on Slashdot. Who knew?"

    A comment that only exists in your fever dreams. You can't point to any evidence, like the "Rooshins did it"-bot that you are.

    https://slashdot.org/~__aaclcg...

    A deleted user account on Slashdot. Who knew? Unlike you, I can show the deleted user, but you can't point to this magically "deleted comment".

    Why is that? It was a simple question, Elasti-Chin: Is FCLM on record that he set up this account?

  192. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Unlike you, I can show the deleted user, but you can't point to this magically "deleted comment".

    This FCLM history page: https://slashdot.org/users2.pl?page=2&uid=5094743&view=userhomepage&fhfilter=%22home%3AFatCashewsLoveMe%22

    Search for the comment ID 56675300 and click on the link. Opps... Comment doesn't exist.

  193. The truth is CRIMER's worst enemy. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That was because you filed a false DMCA request and they deleted the post. We can prove it's false because they unbanned FCLM and then banned your Anonymous Cashews account.

    Who wrote the Tardchris containment FAQ?
    I think we should add links to additional detailed content offsite that thoroughly explains, with examples, what he will do if he is allowed to run around unchecked. Once the entire site is up to speed on the saga then containing him won't be any extra work for anyone.
    Right now he makes a new sock. Whores for karma as much as his posting limit will allow. Start spamming his projects as long as his karma holds out.
    He's contained because he gets caught in the karma whoring phases of his cycle, containment will become effortless and endlessly self-sustaining when we have the whole forum reporting tardchris in his larval stages.

    1. Re:The truth is CRIMER's worst enemy. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      How many blowjobs did FCLM perform to get his account back?

    2. Re:The truth is CRIMER's worst enemy. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      As many as you had to do to get your "account deleted"?

      https://www.kickingthebitbucke...

      But you're toothless, so it must have been a lot better than mine!

  194. Who is "we"? by iq145 · · Score: 1

    i agree most are, but NOT ALL (ahem...)

  195. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Wow, you're right, I've never seen so many anonymous (who can they be?) people know so much about this "creimer" that you deny any knowledge about.

    It is truly a baffling state of affairs.

  196. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "You should be flattered that The Fat Bastard acknowledged your pressence after ignoring you for so long."

    The only press you make Chris is the permanent dent you make in your office chair. How can you be ignoring creimertards when you don't know who or what "creimer" is?

    "Did you enjoy going apeshit all over Slashdot this weekend?"

    Sure did, Elasti-Chin. The entertainment value I get back from you is endless.

  197. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You're delusional in thinking that you have a private bubble and no reads at -1 on Slashdot. Going apeshit over the weekend doesn't help. People are not cursing creimer. They are cursing you for spamming Slashdot with your pastebin. Creimer posted a dozen comments over the weekend and you didn't respond to any of them.

  198. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    _,--=#[The Post CRIMER doesn't want you to read!!!]#=--,_ 1)Why-are-people-upset-with-him? 2)What-can-I-do 3)What-are-his-names 4)Who-is-FatCashewsLovesMe 5)How-to-defeat-his-hustles 6)Why-are-there-dashes 7)Pastebin-Copy

    1)Why-are-people-upset-with-himHe makes frequent low quality posts for two reasons:
    Money) BASICALLY: He made thousands of shitty posts & bragged about how much money it made him.
    DETAILS: He wants u to folow his referer links & pick up his cookie. Even if u dont buy what he linked but do buy something else from that site later on he often makes money;He ALSO tries to drive TRAFFIC to his various BLOGS & vlogs.
    Karma)He believes karma acumulates infinitely So he makes lots of pointles posts that r not bad enough to mod down;hoping they wil get moded up;He was a raging ahole when he thoght he had a karma surplus

    2)What-can-I-do DOWNMOD u wil usually get more mod points. If he is postng from a new sock acount w/ krma, get his oldst posts first. DOWNMOD him and AC in fresh thrads early on;Metmods wil reward u. METAMOD his posts. REPLY ONLY ANONYMOUSLY to the most deeply nested coments in his threds it helps hide his posts. Dwnvote his SUBMISSIONS, he uses to get krma. REPORT HIM to slshdot & the afiliate progrms he is usng. DONT MENTION his brand names c**mer.

    3)What-are-his-namesMost famous:Cre|mer Cdre|mer ILoveFatCashews, Anonymous Cashews, The Fat Bastard aka TCDR
    4)Who-is-FatCashewsLoveMe AKA Tardu Lardo,FCLM Funny & anoying; Not me or crimer;He keeps lookout for infestation

    5)How-can-I-avoid-his-hustles --===DONT FOLLOW HIS LINKS!!!===--
    IF YOU MUST:Use a privte tab & nevr buy anything on the same sesion. If he fools u, close tab, cler the cookies for that site. There r sites other than yutube that wil let u watch his videos. I dont know if people view his contnt but I can pictre his jowls jigling at the thoght of people subvrting his business model
    6)Why-are-there-dashes & weird stuffI know most only skim thse posts. I want the most imprtnt infrmton to pop out at a glnce & to keep it shrt. I dont use TCDRs name becase he may think tht he benfits from geting it indxed by serch engnes. Id like 2 thnk TCDR & FCLM for editrial advice 7)7)Copy: http://archive.is/TtDrY

  199. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "People are not cursing creimer."

    People are not noticing creimer either. Most people don't know who you are, and those that do, don't care either.

    "They are cursing you for spamming Slashdot with your pastebin"

    Like who, for example? Care to provide some evidence for this cursing?

    "Creimer posted a dozen comments over the weekend and you didn't respond to any of them."

    Chris, your ego is so malignant you couldn't resist making yourself obvious. Your ego is also so fragile that you must make us believe you tricked us.

  200. Re:I got a bad case of creimertards... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Wrong venue Pasadena is a huge Reptilian Nazi Hive where the Borg Hiveheads eat Human people. A better location is Fry's Electronics in Burbank with the UFO crashed into the front. They should have rented out the huge parking lot for the 3 days and put up event tents. Plenty of hotels and transportation across the street at the Bob No Hope Airport.