It's not a trend so much as it is a redefinition of intelligence. When you get older, you realize that somebody can be bright/wise/funny despite being fairly st

It's not a trend so much as it is a redefinition of intelligence. When you get older, you realize that somebody can be bright/wise/funny despite being fairly stupid in so-called "quantitative" terms. Somebody who can't read and isn't very logical can still accumulate common sense, mature with age, and become a better person in a lot of ways. So while people are stupider under the strict sense of "Lots of people can't do very simplistic things", they're brighter than the rote negativism would let on. Put another way, I've got a friend who's a poet and who's training to be a nurse who insists Sarah Palin was a brilliant politician maligned by the liberal media. Online it's fun to suggest that a single stupid thought invalidates a person's entire existence, but - both fortunately and unfortunately - it's possible to think stupid things and still be a smart person, and vice versa. Isaac Asimov, one of the most brilliant men I've had the pleasure of reading, wrote a short article on this and on the fallibility of lots of intelligence measures. You can find it here: http://www.wanderings.net/notebook/Main/WhatIsIntelligenceAnywayByIsaacAsimov http://www.wanderings.net/notebook/Main/WhatIsIntelligenceAn...