4chan archive /sci/ (index)
2013-09-01 01:47 6002920 Anonymous (1378020626724.jpg 800x3870 343kB)
Do you think the world is getting dumber? For example, are the 8th graders of today able to answer these questions? Can YOU answer all these?

7 min later 6002926 Anonymous
Man, 1 could hardly be more useless.

12 min later 6002929 Anonymous
i know how to spell endeavor properly me 1 test 0

14 min later 6002930 Anonymous
I'm not American, English is not my first language and I'm not familiar with the Imperial system (I know 1 km is roughly 1.6 miles and 1 m is roughly 3 feet, but I don't know how many feet are in a mile etc.) So I would suffer in everything on that particular test. Although I would have to say some of those questions are strangely worded and I would not know how to answer them without explanation (Geography 2, Grammar 5 etc.). A lot of these questions would be considered trivia today. 8th graders would not be able to do this. Also: >servia

21 min later 6002932 Anonymous
>>6002920 i think the world knows less internally than before, but instead people know methodologies for finding information (using google, wikipedia, etc.) so raw data known might be lower, but ability to find answers and solve simple problems is probably much higher

22 min later 6002934 Anonymous (yeah!.png 163x170 44kB)
>tfw I know all the answers now but I'm certain I would know next to nothing in the 8th grade

22 min later 6002935 Anonymous
>educators once thought sketching a celebrity was a legitimate question in an exam Apparently the world actually went way smarter. At least teachers did.

25 min later 6002936 Anonymous (1305933370118.jpg 720x479 83kB)
>dat math >8th grade >murrica Some questions were tough though, but i suppose it has more to do with my culture rather than my education. >also eu3, mobile easy mode. also this >>6002935 to conclude >murrica

31 min later 6002943 Anonymous
>>6002920 >For example, are the 8th graders of today able to answer these questions? Probably not, but that's not because they're dumber, it's because they haven't crammed for that particular test. Instead they've crammed for present day tests, which 8th graders of 1912 would have trouble with for the same reason. These aren't intelligence tests.

34 min later 6002945 Anonymous
>Kentucky >every intelligent

47 min later 6002954 Anonymous
the 'Civil Government' section is essentially the same as a first year law paper here now, just not in essay format...

50 min later 6002956 Anonymous
>>6002935 8/10 well done sir

53 min later 6002958 BioMed
>servia >roumania krp tet

1 hours later 6002971 Anonymous
>7. A school enrolled 120 pupils and the number of boys was two thirds the number of girls. How many of each sex were enrolled. Both of them.

1 hours later 6002978 Anonymous
Could 8th graders back then pass this test? also yes the majority of people are less intelligent. Reason being no one has to do anything for themselves anymore.

1 hours later 6002981 Anonymous
>>6002958 While the test is rife with spelling errors, most notable in the spelling portion, those two countries are spelled correctly for 1912.

1 hours later 6002986 Anonymous
>>6002978 give me 1 week instruction time, and any current 8th grader could pass it.

1 hours later 6002987 Anonymous
Yes, they could pass because they are fed this info day in and day out. If you knew everything they taught you in high school, you would be considered very smart. Most people could speak a second language, would know alot more math than they would ever use.

1 hours later 6002997 Anonymous (1373382743505.jpg 1600x1375 269kB)
>>6002920 An answer cannot be expected to be inferred, from that image. However, I do think that society as a whole is sustaining people who could not otherwise exist. This includes people with inborn diseases, syndromes, birth defects, retardation and other genetic conditions. A lot of them are even encouraged to breed.

1 hours later 6002998 Anonymous
Gotta love people who prejudge kids got stupider. Show them IQ tests and normalized tests that show children got smarter and they will bitch that IQ is meaningless. On the other hand, the ability to answer some questions they learned when they were children is a totally valid measure of intelligence.

1 hours later 6003003 Anonymous
>>6002997 Addendum: Provided that the condition is negative and not beneficial to the host.

2 hours later 6003018 Anonymous
This has made me realize how dependent I am on my calculator.

2 hours later 6003025 Anonymous
>>6002920 no, I believe the proportion of educated individuals and uneducated individuals remains the same.

2 hours later 6003070 Anonymous
This test is based on information recall of what would have been taught and considered very important then. Nowadays with easy access to internet search engines such as google, such trivia can be learned instantly the second you need it, meaning that people nowadays have access to a much more vast bank of knowledge. What matters in today's society is intelligence and innovation, rather than an ability to remember facts. You're judging them by the wrong scale, why would anyone bother remembering when a historical figure was born when it can be found out within seconds online?

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