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It's ironic that machine intelligence is advancing during an era when human intelligence is declining.

• dullcrisp 1y ago
  Maybe machine intelligence only seems to be advancing from the perspective of human intelligence
  • teberl 1y ago
    I like that thought.
• unsnap_biceps 1y ago
  I feel like declining human intelligence is a result of advancing machine intelligence. Computers are a force multiplier and societal pressure towards building intelligence is reduced.
  • whatnow37373 1y ago
    So the AGI/ASI problem might solve itself: we slowly become incapable of iterating on the problem while existing AI is not nearly advanced enough to pick up the slack. It’s quite beautiful. Once a civilization tries to build machine intelligence it slowly degrades its own capacity during the process thus eventually losing all hope of ever achieving their goal - assuming they still understand their goal at that point. Maybe it’s an algorithm in the Universe to keep us from being naughty.
• anal_reactor 1y ago
  > when human intelligence is declining It's not. It's just that previously we were unaware how stupid people are, and now we're starting to understand this.
• baxtr 1y ago
  Is there scientific evidence for this statement?
• CuriouslyC 1y ago
  The human brain optimizes for efficiency, if that extra intelligence doesn't confer survival benefits it'll be lost. I can't imagine that intelligence doesn't confer survival and reproductive benefits though, it's more likely that the gradient of survival and reproduction between the most intelligent and least has shrunk. In a sense civilization is coddling the weak, and humanity is getting weaker for it.
• huijzer 1y ago
  Maybe on average, but I think it’s probably correlated to inequality. The kid of two Oxford professors will probably be smarter than a kid that grew up in poverty. The school system is aimed at mitigating these differences, but if on average everyone gets less intelligent maybe the school system is working poorly.
  • lazide 1y ago
    Eh, or there is a massive effort to push as many people as possible down Maslow’s hierarchy of needs - which also shows up as being less intelligent. Happening right out in the open, and quite blatantly.
• chneu 1y ago
  It's not. Everytime there's a new form of media or communication there's an uptick in "bad actors". Think yellow journalism or any of the moral panics around TV programming. Even back when the printing press was invented there was an uptick in troll behavior. One of the Green brothers posited that martin Luther was really just a pamphlet troll. With social media and the Internet, stupid just got louder. I don't think people got stupid.
  • croes 1y ago
    Not just louder, it got in power
  • baxtr 1y ago
    Yes. Exactly right. Also well documented. Anyone interested, read the book: Attention Merchants by Wu.
  • sdsd 1y ago
    Yes and no. In swaths of the world, we're actually observing a reverse Flynn effect and IQ has been dropping, in some places for decades. Eg: https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/a43469569/american-iq-scores-decline-reverse-flynn-effect/ https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/a43469569/american-...
    • _Algernon_ 1y ago
      This started long before the internet.
      • trollbridge 1y ago
        Started in 2006 in Denmark and seemed to start a few years ago in the U.S… coinciding with smartphones (which I think will make us even dumber).
    • jimbob45 1y ago
      IQ tests are administration-sensitive and have changed dramatically since the beginning of such a Flynn effect study. The population makeup of many countries has changed in recent years to include many immigrants for whom the study would make exceedingly little sense to include. IQ tests do not cover and do not claim to cover a comprehensive view of human intelligence, famously lacking verbal and social components entirely. It is possible past IQ tests were simply overtuned and we’re now seeing the natural correction.
• apwell23 1y ago
  > era when human intelligence is declining is it ? i am listening to most beautiful music that was ever created. it was created in 2024.
  • daseiner1 1y ago
    would citing lebron james explain away the obesity epidemic?
    • bethekidyouwant 1y ago
      Yes, the strongest man who ever lived is alive today. The best player of every sport is alive today . It absolutely supports the theory support the theory that the smartest person ever is alive today, etc. etc..
  • daseiner1 1y ago
    what music??
• enaaem 1y ago
  Most people are not stupid. They react to their emotions.