The notion that humans are growing increasingly dumb has been around for millennia. Socrates, in his Unapologia, noted how his fellow Athenians didn't know their "arse from an urn." And Desiderius Erasmus was equally appalled by the ignorance of his Dutch neighbors. Not only were they all going to hell, he said, but they would probably get lost along the way.
I've been saying the same thing to my lovely wife for years, but she has always dismissed my thoughts as more examples of my celebrated misanthropy. Now I can wave a new study in her face and say, "Ha!"
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