I have been thinking a lot since the election about what could explain the incredibly high numbers of Americans who seem incapable of critical thinking, or really any kind of high level rational thought or analysis.

Then I stumbled on this post https://old.reddit.com/r/guns/comments/16ires5/lead_exposure_from_shooting_is_a_much_more/

Which essentially explains that “Shooting lead bullets at firing ranges results in elevated BLLs at concentrations that are associated with a variety of adverse health outcome"

I looked at the pubmed abstract in that Reddit post and also this one https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5289032/

Which states, among other things, “Workers exposed to lead often show impaired performance on neurobehavioral test involving attention, processing, speed, visuospatial abilities, working memory and motor function. It has also been suggested that lead can adversely affect general intellectual performance.”

Now, given that there are well in excess of 300 million guns in the United States, is it possible lead exposure at least partially explains how brain dead many Americans seem to be?

This is a genuine question not a troll and id love to read some evidence to the contrary if any is available

  • MissJinx@lemmy.world
    124·
    13 hours ago

    It’s really the idiocracy theory. Dumb people have more and more kids while smart people tend to have 0 to 2 kids. It’s exponetially growing the amount of dumb people. Besides some people that had potential dumbed themselfs down by joining organized religion. very sad

    • Denjin@lemmings.world
      9·
      11 hours ago

      It’s not smart vs dumb though, it’s educated vs uneducated. I seemingly small distinction but a critical one.

      There’s a distinct inverse correlation with the mean education level of a population and their birth rate (the better educated a group is the fewer babies they have) especially when you look at the women in that population.

      Uneducated parents don’t value education in their children and so on and so on. Educated parents very much do value education in their children and actively participate in the schooling.

      These two factors together mean that there’s a increasing number of people who do not value educating themselves or their children and also tend to identify with those politicians who present as uneducated (while actually being highly educated and highly intelligent but lacking in any empathy or morality). This is one factor in why populist parties are gaining traction again in western democracies.

      • MutilationWave@lemmy.world
        4·
        10 hours ago

        Don’t forget the gutting of the school system over the past 40 years. Now we’re at “Let’s abolish the Department of Education”. It’s so sick.

      • MutilationWave@lemmy.world
        51·
        10 hours ago

        It’s not eugenics. Nobody was forced to have more or less children and none of it was based on ethnicity. It’s an uncomfortable thing to talk about, but it’s real. Unlike eugenics.

        • JackbyDev@programming.devEnglish
          3·
          6 hours ago

          I think you may have misunderstood me. I’m not saying Idiocracy is a movie about eugenics. I’m saying that believing the world is getting dumber because dumb people have more babies and smart people don’t is eugenics adjacent.

          • MutilationWave@lemmy.world
            1·
            6 hours ago

            I think we’re operating on slightly different definitions of eugenics. I looked it up to see if I was mistaken. Eugenics, by definition, involves State power to arrange. Whether by policy, law, or even forced sterilization and outright murder.

            I just learned that there’s an idea called new eugenics or liberal eugenics. It strips out the use of State power, leaving the decisions up to the parents.

        • sarah ash (She/They)@lemmy.blahaj.zone
          42·
          10 hours ago

          Yes it it it at least spreads harmful ideas about genetic and biological essentialism.

          And no its not because of “stupid people” that the election turned out the way it did.

          The subject is more complex and saying it was due to stupidity is a very easy answer that ignores the role power and wealth and a broken system play into the victory of trump.

          • MutilationWave@lemmy.world
            21·
            9 hours ago

            I’m not saying stupid people pass on stupid genes and I don’t think the movie did either. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen it. It’s a fact that uneducated people have more children. It’s more that stupid people raise stupid kids and the school system is continually getting worse. So the kids just don’t have much of a chance.