Why You Are Dumber Than Your Parents (The Sad Truth)

Added: 2026-05-23

[00:00:00]Do you think you are smarter than your parents? Let me tell you something. You are probably wrong. For 50 years each generation outperformed the previous one on intelligence tests. They call this the Flynn effect. Someone born in 1980 was on paper much smarter than their family. But in 1995 that proud line ran out of breath and pointed downwards.

[00:00:20]Yes, our scores are falling and at an alarming rate. First they wanted to blame genetics, but when siblings raised in the same house and at the same table were studied in Norway, a harsh truth came to light. The younger sibling scored lower than the older one. The blood was the same. The seed was the same. But the world they grew up in had changed. We are experiencing a silent mental decline. So, [clears throat] who poisoned our air?