Are we becoming more stupid? - NOT amateur radio

Having just finished reading Bill Bryson's excellent book called, "The Road to Little Dribbling" (a laugh on every page!), I was struck by something he said.

Are we getting more stupid?

If you look around, you could be forgiven for thinking this. On TV quiz shows I am amazed how poor most UK people are on UK geography: no-one seems to know where anywhere is in our connected world! Allegedly, many USA citizens do not know where California or Texas is.  Allegedly Sarah Palin thought Africa was a country. England? Where is that? Iraq? Iran? Afghanistan?

Bryson may have a point. Perhaps we are slowly being poisoned by something in our foods or atmosphere that is adversely impacting our brains. Perhaps we really are dimmer than our forefathers. Certainly we seem to be thicker and need things dumbing down. Are we also more selfish?

It would not totally surprise me if we found out in years to come that something, currently unknown, is slowly doing us harm. The most worrisome thing is we may be too stupid to even realise!