4 ms·
People born before the 1980 are also of significantly lower IQ up to a 7-8 points due to leaded gas use. The boomers and gen X really did a number on themselves
by hurubaw 7mo ago
People born before the 1980 are also of significantly lower IQ up to a 7-8 points due to leaded gas use. The boomers and gen X really did a number on themselves with environmental hazards.
- nickdothutton 7mo ago1901 Oldsmobile curved dashboard was the first mass produced car. Lead was introduced to gasoline around 1920. You want the "Lost Generation", born 1883-1900.
- fnordpiglet 7mo agoGen X also gave you the web, google, facebook, YouTube, twitter, and additive algorithmic brain rot. So who got the better deal?
- perch56 7mo agoIn countries that phased out lead later, even early Millennials faced similar or worse childhood exposure. It’s a global generational story, just with different timelines by country. As a personal example, Romania only phased out leaded gasoline at the end of 2004.
- ehnto 7mo agoSome places still allow it in civil aviation too.
- MSFT_Edging 7mo agoThe US is one. If you live by a small airport frequented by personal aircraft, you're getting bombarded by lead. Now just imagine living next to a teaching airport that does aerial laps around the neighborhood.
- rkhassen9 7mo agoWhy the hate on the gens? Most of this stuff was not widely known. There was no internet, so you only got info from 3 tv channels and a newspaper, magazines and conversation. Blame it on the corps.
- Gud 7mo agoIntelligent people read books.
- MSFT_Edging 7mo agoLead poisoning was discovered in a year that is denoted with "B.C.E". It wasn't news when the additive was invented for gasoline in the 20s, and it wasn't news all through the 70s. Of course blame it on the corporations. On GM specifically, who also lobbied for jay-walking to become illegal so their cars would stop getting bad press for killing people.
- ricardo81 7mo agoA necessary (?) part of progress IMO. Environmental hazards have been a thing for a lot longer too. Settlements used to be covered in smog due to coal fires for example. Part of the environmental/emissions argument from developing countries is about past emissions by developed countries. I think it's a fair argument to say given these sacrifices made by past generations in industrialised countries + the benefit of developed cleaner technologies through that industrialisation is an argument against that.
- throwup238 7mo ago> Settlements used to be covered in smog due to coal fires for example. London first tried to ban burning coal within the city in 1306 due to the air quality.
- ricardo81 7mo agoThat long ago. Surely that helped identify it as a problem even though the science behind it would have been lacking.
- jl6 7mo agoI strongly suspect that most of the things we now know to be problematic were also known to be problematic to the ancients, but were thought still to be worth it for their rewards. That’s pretty much where we still are today. Nobody likes breathing pollution, everybody likes modernity.
- ricardo81 7mo agoYes, some things would have just stood to reason in a general respect, even if there wasn't hard science to back it up.
- JKCalhoun 7mo agoI suppose even then it would have been obvious to anyone traveling outside London that, hmmm, the fog/smog goes away out here. Only in major cities… What could it be?
- cmrdporcupine 7mo agoUs GenXers didn't do this to ourselves. Boomers (and their parents) did it to us. I was born '74. Alberta, Canada. I remember people raising a huge stink about "guvmint' interference" when leaded gasoline was banned and when seatbelt use became mandatory. And don't even get started about cigarettes and mandatory separate smoking areas at restaurants etc. "Liberty" and "freedom" were concepts substantially abused and misapplied throughout the 20th century.
- kstenerud 7mo agoThey still are. Measles was on the road to being eradicated until 10 years ago.
- jazz9k 7mo agoThe part you are leaving out is that illegals (now in the millions), living in the US are almost never vaccinated for measles.
- analog31 7mo agoVaccinate them. That's a policy failure.
- mikeyouse 7mo agoYet the measles outbreak in Northern Mexico was caused by antivax white mennonites who brought it from Texas. Turns out there are subpopulations everywhere who need to be vaccinated - if only we had evidence-based people in charge of public health instead of wellness grifters.
- Cthulhu_ 7mo agoCan you cite some sources? Because most countries have a functioning vaccination program, in part thanks to now-cancelled USAID funding. But vaccination rates have been dropping, just like in the US. https://www.unicef.org/lac/en/press-releases/latin-america-and-caribbean-records-worlds-biggest-drop-childhood-vaccination-over-past-decade https://www.unicef.org/lac/en/press-releases/latin-america-a... Your comment reads like anti-immigrant propaganda. If USAID were to be restored, the US could use its vast wealth to improve global health. But the current US regime is decisively anti-vax and wants everyone to suffer unnecessarily from preventable disease.
- yomismoaqui 7mo agoQuestion is what is worse for IQ development in children/teens: exposure to leaded gas or TikTok?