IQ and Intelligence

IQ scores have been going up in the last 100 years.

But we are not getting more intelligent as a species.

We were not stupider in the past.

The most complex music that we have on record is from Bach 300 years ago.

Most of the music that we have record of is from the past 300 years.*

Music in America today is far less complex, much more baby simplistic, than it was 40 years ago.

We were not dumber in the past.

IQ is not intelligence.

There can be many explanations for why IQ has gone up.

Maybe education has gone up in the past 100 years.

But we were not that much more poorly educated 1000 years ago.

Today's common man gets more education that they did 150 years ago.

But scholars and monks in just about every society across Asia and the Mediterranean got at least as good an education 1000 years ago as today's finest get.

And music education was very high in 'Black' Africa 1000 years ago.

Maybe we are developing testable skills more than untestable skills today.

American television shows are written on a more sophistocated level than they were 40 years ago.

But the spiritual substance is crap compared to American television 40 years ago.

In testable literary sophistocation American television has gone up.

In intangible, untestable philosophical substance it has gone way down.**

Outside of American television shows, though, this is a good thing, for this is exactly what an industrial economy and our mastering of industrial technology needs, and outside of American television, wisdom is going up, not down, worldwide. (Wisdom is much higher in the governments of Poland, Bulgaria and Romania today compared to 40 years ago!)

Most of all, though, the world is recovering.

The world is recovering from the worst disaster that human civilization has ever seen.

100 years ago in the time of the World Wars, people were way more distracted and way more stressed out.

Naturally, this is probably reflected in IQ scores.

But Bach writes far more sophistocated music than just about anybody from the past 40 years.

Seki Kowa and Newton advanced mathematics far more than anyone in the past 60 years.

And Confucius, Lao-tzu, Chuang-tzu and The Buddha, Plato and Marcus Aurelius have a lot that they can teach us.

God loves you!

Sincerely,

David S. Annderson

*Most of the music we have on record is from the past 300 years because Western European civilization is young, and most other civilizations, from India to Persia to 'Black' Africa, developed art music that was improvised, more like modern jazz today, and so we don't have record of their art music. But their art music was just as sophistocated as Europe's, and they had their own Bachs!

**American television is an exception. Testable skills are not necessarily being developed at the expense of wisdom in most places. Basic survival skills that we use to support the success of society rely far more on testable technical skills today than 250 years ago because of modern technology and the Industrial Revolution. The survival skills of society are now far more in testable technical skills supporting technology. It is intangible survival skills, which are now far less necessary because of our technology, that testable skills are being developed at the expense of, not wisdom. Except in modern American television.

A modern economy relies more on testable science skills today. An economy 300 years ago relied more on a farmer's feel for the weather, farmer's and merchant's street smarts and a sailor's feel for the weather than on testable science skills. This is where testable skills have gone up and intangible skills have gone down.

As for wisdom in American television... 40 years ago, you had classic Sesame Street, Reading Rainbow, and Mister Rogers Neighborhood. 30 years ago you had Star Trek: The Next Generation. These shows had deep philosophy. You can live your life by it. I know many of them are children's shows. But their ideas are up with the finest in literature. You can live your life by what Jim Henson and Mister Rogers were teaching 40 years ago. Try living your life by CSI. You won't like it. You'll be miserable. What's life without happiness? I'd rather live my life by Happy Days than CSI. But that's just a typical hit show from 40 years ago. CSI is one of the least philosophically backwards shows on American television in the last 20 years. (as of 2022) A lot of it is far more paranoid delusional. America's finest television 40 years ago had wisdom. Loads of it.

(Big Bang Theory was the one bright spot!)

You want to live your life by something made recently... watch the Trolls movie, Aamir Khan's movie PK, or anything by Miyazaki!