Smart phone, dumb people: is technology really reducing our intelligence?

IQ testing is one of those areas that always seems to polarise opinion, with many considering it useful for children as long as it is understood to be related to specific areas of intelligence rather than a person's entire intellectual capabilities. However, many organisations, including some employers, use IQ tests as a primary filter, so unfortunately it cannot be ignored as either irrelevant or outdated. Just as much of the education system is still geared towards passing exams, IQ tests are seen as a valid method to sort potential candidates. They may not be completely valid, but are used as a short-cut tool that serves a limited purpose.

James Flynn of the University of Otago in New Zealand has undertaken long-term research into intelligence, so much so that the 'Flynn Effect' is the name given to the worldwide increase in intelligence since IQ tests were developed over a century ago. The reasons behind this increase are not fully understood, but are probably due to the complex interaction of numerous environmental factors such as enriched audio-visual stimulation, better - and more interactive - education methods, even good artificial lighting for longer hours of reading and writing. It is interesting that as developing nations rapidly gain these improvements to society and infrastructure, their average IQ shows a correspondingly rapid increase when compared to the already developed West and its more staid advancement.

Research suggests that while young children's IQ continues to increase in developed nations, albeit at a reduced rate, the intelligence of teenagers in these countries has been in slow decline over the past thirty years. What is more, the higher the income decile, the larger the decrease. This hints that the causes are more predominant in middle-class lifestyles; basically, family wealth equates to loss of IQ! Data for the UK and Scandinavian countries indicates that a key factor may be the development of consumer electronics, starting with VCRs, games consoles and home computers and now complemented by smart phones, tablets and social media. This would align with the statistics, since the drop is highest among children likely to have greatest access to the devices. So could it be true that our digital distractions are dumbing us down?

1) Time

By spending more time on electronic devices, children live in a narrower world, where audio-visual stimulation aims for maximum enjoyment with minimal effort, the information and imagery flying by at dizzying speed. This isn't just the AV presentation of course: digital content itself closely aligns to pop cultural cornerstones, being glamorous, gimmicky, transient and expendable. As such, the infinitesimally small gradations of social status and friendship that exist amongst children and teenagers requires enormous effort on their part to maintain a constant online presence, both pro-actively and reactively responding to their peers' (and role models') endless inanities.

The amount of effort it would take to filter this is mind-boggling and presumably takes away a lot of time that could be much better spent on other activities. This doesn't have to be something as constructive as reading or traditional studying: going outdoors has been shown to have all sorts of positive effects, as described in Richard Louv's 2005 best-seller Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children From Nature-Deficit Disorder.

Studies around the world have shown that there are all sorts of positive effects, including on mood, by mere immersion in nature, not just strenuous physical activity. Whether humans have an innate need for observing the intricate fractal patterns of vegetation (grass lawns and playing fields have been found to be ineffective) or whether it's noticing the seemingly unorganised behaviour of non-human life forms, the Japanese government have promoted Shinrin-yoku or 'forest air bathing' as a counterbalance to the stresses of urbanised existence. It sounds a bit New Age, but there is enough research to back up the idea that time spent in the natural environment can profoundly affect us.

Meanwhile, other nations appear to have given in, as if admitting that their citizens have turned into digitally-preoccupied zombies. Last year, the Dutch town of Bodegraven decided to reduce accidents to mobile-distracted pedestrians by installing red and green LED strips at a busy road junction, so that phone users could tell if it was safe to cross without having to look up!

2) Speed

One obvious change in the past four decades has been in the increased pace of life in developed nations. As we have communication and information retrieval tools that are relatively instantaneous, so employers expect their workforce to respond in tune with the speed of these machines. This act-now approach hardly encourages in-depth cogitation but relies upon seat-of-the-pants thinking, which no doubt requires a regular input of caffeine and adrenaline. The emphasis on rapid turnaround, when coupled with lack of patience, has led to an extremely heavy reliance on the first page of online search results: being smart at sifting through other people's data is fast becoming a replacement for original thought, as lazy students have discovered and no doubt as many school teachers and university lecturers could testify.

Having a convenient source of information means that it is easier for anyone to find a solution to almost anything rather than working something out for themselves. This can lead to a decline in initiative, something which separates thought leaders from everyone else. There is a joy to figuring out something, which after all is a key motivation for many STEM professionals. Some scientists and engineers have explained that being able to understand the inner workings of common objects was a key component of their childhood, leading to an obvious career choice. For example, New Zealand-based scientist and science communicator Michelle Dickinson (A.K.A. Nanogirl) spent her childhood dismantling and repairing such disparate household items as home computers and toasters, echoing Ellie Arroway, the heroine in Carl Sagan's novel Contact, who as a child repaired a defective valve radio before going on to become a radio astronomer.

Of course, these days it would be more difficult to repair contemporary versions of these items, since they are often built so that they cannot even be opened except in a machine shop. Laptops and tablets are prime examples and I've known cases where the likes of Microsoft simply replace rather than repair a screen-damaged device. When I had a desktop computer I frequently installed video and memory cards, but then how-to videos are ubiquitous on YouTube. The latest generation of technology doesn't allow for such do-it-yourself upgrades, to the manufacturer's advantage and the consumer's detriment. As an aside, it's worrying that so many core skills such as basic repairs or map navigation are being lost; in the event of a massive power and/or network outage due to the likes of a solar flare, there could be a lot of people stuck in headless chicken mode. Squawk!

3) Quality

While the World Wide Web covers every subject imaginable (if being of immensely variable quality), that once fairly reliable source of information, television, has largely downgraded the sometimes staid but usually authoritative documentaries of yesteryear into music promo-style pieces of infotainment. Frequently unnecessary computer graphics and overly-dramatic reconstructions and voice overs are interwoven between miniscule sound bites from the experts, the amount of actual information being conveyed reduced to a bare minimum.

In many cases, the likes of the Discovery Channel are even disguising pure fiction as fact, meaning that children - and frequently adults - are hard-placed to differentiate nonsense from reality. This blurring of demarcation does little to encourage critical or even sustained thinking; knowledge in the media and online has been reduced to a consumer-led circus with an emphasis on marketing and hype. Arguably, radio provides the last media format where the majority of content maintains a semblance of sustained, informative discussion on STEM issues.

4) Quantity

The brave new world of technology that surrounds us is primarily geared towards consumerism; after all, even social media is fundamentally a tool for targeted marketing. If there's one thing that manufacturers do not want it is inquisitive customers, since the buzzwords and hype often hide a lack of quality underneath. Unfortunately, the ubiquity of social media and online news in general means that ridiculous ideas rapidly become must-have fads.

Even such commodities as food and drink have become mired with trendy products like charcoal-infused juice, unpasteurised milk and now raw water, attracting the same sort of uncritical punters who think that nutrition gurus know what really constituted human diets in the Palaeolithic. The fact that some of Silicon Valley's smartest have failed to consider the numerous dangers of raw water shows that again, analytical thinking is taking a back seat to whatever is the latest 'awesome' and 'cool' lifestyle choice.

Perhaps then certain types of thinking are becoming difficult to inculcate and sustain in our mentally vulnerable teenagers due to the constant demands of consumerism and its oh-so-seductive delivery channels. Whether today's youth will fall into the viewing habits of older generations, such as the myriad of 'food porn' shows remains to be seen; with so much on offer, is it any wonder people spend entire weekends binge watching series, oblivious to the wider world?

The desire to fit into a peer group and not be left behind by lack of knowledge about some trivia or other, for example about the latest series on Netflix, means that so much time is wasted on activities that only require a limited number of thought processes. Even a good memory isn't required anymore, with electronic calendars and calculators among the simplest of tools available to replace brain power. Besides which, the transience in popular culture means there's little need to remember most of what happened last week!

Ultimately, western nations are falling prey to the insular decadence well known from history as great civilisations pass their prime. Technology and the pace of contemporary life dictated by it must certainly play a part in any decline in IQ, although the human brain being what it is - after all, the most complex object in the known universe - I wouldn't dare guess how much is due to them.

There are probably other causes that are so familiar as to be practically invisible. Take for instance background noise, both visual and aural, which permeates man-made environments. My commute yesterday offers a typical example of the latter sort, with schoolchildren on my train playing loud music on their phones that could be heard some metres away to the two building sites I walked by, plus a main road packed with vehicles up to the size of construction trucks. As a final bonus, I passed ten shops and cafes that were all playing loud if inane pop music that could be heard on the street, through open doors. Gone are the days of tedious elevator muzak: even fairly expensive restaurants play material so fast and loud it barely constitutes the term 'background music'. If such sensory pollution is everywhere, when do we get to enjoy quality cogitation time?

If you think that consumerism isn't as all-encompassing as I state, then consider that the USA spends more per year on pet grooming than it does on nuclear fusion research. I mean, do you honestly really need a knee-high wall-mounted video phone to keep in touch with your dog or cat while you're at work? Talking of which, did you know that in 2015 the Kickstarter crowdfunding platform's Exploding Kittens card game raised almost US$9 million in less than a month? Let's be frank, we've got some work to do if we are to save subsequent generations from declining into trivia-obsessed sheeple. Baa!

O Come, All ye Fearful: 12 woes for Christmas future

This month I thought I would try and adopt something of the Yuletide spirit by offering something short and sharp (if not sweet) that bares a passing resemblance to the carol On the Twelve Days of Christmas. However, instead of gifts I'll be attempting to analyse twelve key concerns that humanity may face in the near future, some being more immediate - not to mention inevitable - than others.

I'll start off with the least probable issues then gradually work down to those most likely to have widespread effects during the next few decades. As it is meant to be a season of good cheer I'll even suggest a few solutions or mitigation strategies where these are applicable. The ultimate in low-carb gifts: what more could you ask for?

12: ET phones Earth. With the SETI Institute and Breakthrough Listen project leading efforts to pick up signals from alien civilisations, what are the chances that we might receive an extra-terrestrial broadcast in the near future? Although many people might deem this just so much science fiction, the contents of a translated message (or autonomous probe) could prove catastrophic. Whether it would spark faith-based wars or aid the development of advanced technology we couldn't control - or be morally fit enough to utilise - there may be as many negative issues as positive ones.

Solution: Keeping such information secret, especially the raw signal data, would be incredibly difficult. Whether an international translation project could be conducted in secret is another matter, with censorship allowing a regular trickle of the less controversial information into the public domain. Whilst this is the antithesis of good scientific practice, it could prove to be the best solution in the long term. Not that most politicians are ever able to see anything that way, however!

11. Acts of God. There is a multitude of naturally-occurring events that are outside of human control, both terrestrial (e.g. super volcano, tsunami) and extra-terrestrial, such as asteroid impacts. Again, until recently few people took much interest in the latter, although Hollywood generated some awareness via several rather poor movies in the late 1990s. The Chelyabinsk meteor of February 2013 (rather than meteorite, as most of the material exploded at altitude led to 1500 injuries, showing that even a small object that doesn't reach the ground intact can cause havoc. Since 2000, there have been over twenty asteroid impacts or atmospheric break-ups ranging from a kiloton up to half a megaton.

Solution: Although there are various projects to assess the orbits of near-Earth objects (NEOs), the development of technologies to deflect or destroy impactors requires much greater funding than is currently in place. Options range from devices that use just their velocity to knock NEOs off-course to the brute force approach of high-powered lasers and hydrogen bombs. However, with the cancellation of NASA's Ares V heavy launch vehicle it's difficult to see how such solutions could be delivered in time. Hopefully in the event something would be cobbled together pretty quickly!

10. Grey goo scenario. As defined by Eric Drexler in his 1986 book Engines of Creation, what if self-replicating nanobots (developed for example, for medical purposes), break their programming and escape into the world, eating everything in their path? Similar to locust swarms, they would only be limited by the availability of raw materials.

Solution: The Royal Society's 2004 report on nanoscience declared that the possibility of von Neumann machines are some decades away and therefore of little concern to regulators. Since then, other research has suggested there should be limited need to develop such machines anyway. So that's good to know!

9. Silicon-destroying lifeforms. What if natural mutations lead to biological organisms that can seriously damage integrated circuitry? A motherboard-eating microbe would be devastating, especially in the transport and medical sectors, never mind the resulting communication network outages and financial chaos. This might sound as ridiculous as any low-grade science fiction plot, but in 1975 nylon-eating bacteria were discovered. Since then, research into the most efficient methods to recover metals from waste electronics have led to experiments in bioleaching. As well as bacteria, the fungus Aspergillus niger has been shown to breakdown the metals used in circuits.

Solution: As bioleaching is potentially cheaper and less environmentally damaging it could become widespread. Therefore it will be up to the process developers to control their creations. Fingers crossed, then!

8. NCB. Conventional weapons may be more common place, but the development of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons by rogue states and terrorist organisations is definitely something to be worried about. The International Atomic Energy Agency has a difficult time keeping track of all the radioactive material that is stolen or goes missing each year.  As the 1995 fatal release of the nerve agent sarin on the Tokyo subway shows, terrorists are not unwilling to use weapons of mass destruction on the general public.

Solution: There's not much I can suggest here. Let's hope that the intelligence services can keep all the Dr Evils at bay.

7. Jurassic Park for real. At Harvard last year a chicken embryo's genes were tweaked in such a way as to create a distinctly dinosaurian snout rather than a beak. Although it may be sometime before pseudo-velociraptors are prowling (high-fenced) reserves, what if genome engineering was used to develop Homo superior? A 2014 paper from Michigan State University suggests both intellectual and physical improvements via CRISPR-cas9 technology is just around the corner.

Solution: If the tabloids are to be believed (as if) China will soon be editing human genomes, to fix genetic diseases as well as generating enhanced humans. Short of war, what's to stop them?

6. DIY weaponry. The explosion in 3D printers for the domestic market means that you can now make your own handguns. Although current designs wear out after a few firings, bullets are also being developed that will work without limiting their lifespan. Since many nations have far more stringent gun laws than the USA, an increase in weaponry among the general public is just what we don't need.

Solution: how about smart locking systems on printers so they cannot produce components that could be used to build a weapon? Alternatively, there are now 3D printer models that can manufacture prototype bulletproof clothing. Not that I'd deem that a perfect solution!

5. Chemical catastrophe. There are plenty of chemicals no longer in production that might affect humanity or our agriculture. These range from the legacy effects of polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB), a known carcinogen, to the ozone depletion causing by CFCs, which could be hanging around the stratosphere for another century; this doesn't just result in increased human skin cancer - crops are also affected by the increased UVB.

Solution: we can only hope that current chemical development now has more rigorous testing and government regulation than that accorded to PCBs, CFCs, DDTs, et al. Let's hope all that health and safety legislation pays off.

4. The energy crisis. Apart from the obvious environmental issues around fossil fuels, the use of fracking generates a whole host of problems on its own, such as the release of methane and contamination of groundwater by toxic chemicals, including radioactive materials.

Solution: more funding is required for alternatives, especially nuclear fusion (a notoriously expensive area to research). Iceland generated 100% of its electricity from renewables whilst Portugal managed 4 consecutive days in May this year via wind, hydro, biomass and solar energy sources. Greater recycling and more incentives for buying electric and hybrid vehicles wouldn't hurt either!

3. Forced migration. The rise in sea levels due to melt water means that it won't just be Venice and small Pacific nations that are likely to become submerged by the end of the century. Predictions vary widely, but all in the same direction: even an increase of 150mm would be likely to affect over ten million people in the USA alone, with probably five times that number in China facing similar issues.

Solution: a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions would seem to be the thing. This requires more electric vehicles and less methane-generating livestock. Arnold Schwarzenegger's non-fossil fuel Hummers and ‘Less meat, less heat, more life' campaign would appear to be good promotion for the shape of things to come - if he can be that progressive, there's hope for everyone. Then of course there's the potential for far more insect-based foodstuffs.

2. Food and water. A regional change in temperature of only a few degrees can seriously affect crop production and the amount of water used by agriculture. Over 700 million people are already without clean water, with shortages affecting agriculture even in developed regions - Australia and California spring to mind. Apparently, it takes a thousand litres of water to generate a single litre of milk!

Solution: A few far-sighted Australian farmers are among those developing methods to minimise water usage, including a few low-tech schemes that could be implemented anywhere. However, really obvious solutions would be to reduce the human population and eat food that requires less water. Again, bug farming seems a sensible idea.

1. Preventing vegegeddon. A former professor at Oxford University told me that some of his undergraduates have problems relating directly to others, having grown up in an environment with commonplace communication via electronic interfaces. If that's the problem facing the intellectual elite, what hope for the rest of our species? Physical problems such as poor eyesight are just the tip of the iceberg: the human race is in severe danger of degenerating into low-attention ‘sheeple' (as they say on Twitter). Children are losing touch with the real world, being enticed into virtual environments that on the surface are so much more appealing. Without knowledge or experience of reality, even stable democracies are in danger of being ruled by opportunistic megalomaniacs, possibly in orange wigs.

Solution: Richard Louv, author of  Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children From Nature-Deficit Disorder suggests children require unstructured time out of doors in order to gain an (occasionally painful) understanding of  the real world; tree-climbing, fossicking, etc. Restricting time on electronic devices would seem to go hand in hand with this.

Well, that about wraps it up from me. And if the above seems somewhat scary, then why not do something about it: wouldn't working for a better future be the best Christmas present anyone could ever give?