To see the Freedom to Screech man of the year for the 2013 edition, a guy who has been dead since 2011, find the highlighted link below.
To learn who the outstanding women are (I believe they're all living), go here.
I print these in their hilarious entirety without correcting grammatical errors, because there is no need to drive traffic to FOS when the laughs can be right here.
---
FREEDOM OF SPEECH SALUTES THE 10 OUTSTANDING MEN OF 2012...
The heart of a city is it's people. These men stand up for the best interest for New Albany citizens.
They work hard and play by the rules. And most of all they look out for their neighbors, co-workers, and the many needs of the "little people" of New Albany.
It's well known these men have:
* Supported the best interest for New Albany citizens
* Worked with local groups to provide food and supplies for the needy
* Listened to concerns of the public
* Not afraid to stand up for the rights of us citizens
* Supports the best interest of fellow employees
* They put their lives on the line for all New Albany citizens
* Successful businessman who give back to our community
* Goes above and beyond to bring detailed information to the table
* They always lend a helping hand to the citizens of New Albany
* Dedicated to real public service
Freedom Of Speech salutes and appreciates these outstanding 10 men, and their courage to stand up for what is right. These men through generosity and compassion devote themselves to helping others.
They are a great example of leadership in New Albany:
Todd Bailey - Former Police Chief
David Brewer - New Albany Building Commissioner
Ed Clere - State Representative
Matt Denison - Former City Operation Manager
Brian Gadd - Asst. Fire Chief
Roger Jeffers - Newly Appointed Floyd County Parks Superintendent
Maurice King - Former Citizens Advocate
Chris Morris - Editor, New Albany Tribune
John Schellenberger - 4th District County Council
Bill Schmidt - Former City Councilman, and private citizen
Showing posts with label troglodyte logic. Show all posts
Showing posts with label troglodyte logic. Show all posts
Monday, January 28, 2013
Sunday, December 30, 2012
Chinatown on Charlestown Road, and a "rewind" to "On the very nature of nay-saying."
In all sincerity, it's good that Earth Friends is relocating to Louisville, and the Exchange already is up and running at its new downtown New Albany location.
But the departures leave two vacancies in the commercial area just inside the beltway on Grant Line Road, near the original location of my own beer and food business. Granted, these could be filled soon, and the overall situation is by no means bad in my Northside neighborhood.
It also could be better, and there doesn't seem to be any firm public plan on the part of local, various economic "development" entities or business owners themselves to improve prospects therein, although getting the Grant Line Road construction project finished certainly helps. To me, the ultimate goal remains connecting IUS with Community Park, and maintaining a locally-owned economy as much as possible in between.
Arguably, matters are far less hopeful on Charlestown Road, roughly between Slate Run Road and Silver Street. There are quite a few commercial vacancies there, especially amid the zombie fast food row by McDonald’s. The ideal solution would be to raze all of it and replant trees, but American capitalism probably precludes such a reason-based course.
A long time ago – 2005, to be exact – when downtown was as yet moribund and revitalization meant anywhere else except here, we returned from a trip to Chicago and it struck me that metro Louisville needed an Asian community like the Windy City’s thriving Chinatown. I looked at the empty buildings downtown and thought, hmm, this looks like a fine place for it; if we can’t do it, I bet the Chinese could. China has the investment capital and the work ethic. Just let ‘em have the buildings, and get out of the way.
Perhaps now that the doughnut hole has moved to Charlestown Road, so has the ideal location of our Chinatown, with Indonesian where the Wendy’s used to be, and Filipino at the old KFC. Colonial Manor could function as NA’s Iroquois, with a grocery as good as ValuMarket. I’m not sure where this leaves Sonic, but we'll figure it out.
Here’s the article I wrote seven years ago. The pink spitwad blogyard has yielded to decaying tabletop linoleum, and while much has been accomplished, much more needs to be done. We might need a Russian oligarch for this.
---
Rog's rant: On the very nature of nay-saying (June 21, 2005)
We spent the weekend in Chicago, and as is the case every time I return home from a trip, it takes a few days to adjust to the state of mind.
The culture shock stands to be a bit greater this time.
Our hotel in Chicago, chosen because it was the cheapest in close proximity to downtown, was located in the heart of Chinatown, one hundred yards from the subway stop and several thousand miles away from just another place to stay.
By this I mean that Chicago’s Chinatown is just that – touristy to an expected degree, but filled to the brim with, well, people from China (and some from Vietnam, Malaysia and other Asian locales). Sometimes none of the voices to be heard are speaking English. It’s easy to catch yourself thinking that you’re somewhere else, not Illinois.
Stand at the right spot, and the aromas of cooking fill the street, emanating from ubiquitous restaurants with dining rooms often tucked away on upper floors, eateries relieving tourists like us of our cash while pulling extra duty as community centers.
Early Sunday morning we entered a bakery and were shooed into the almost hidden rear section, where the satellite television was entirely in Chinese. The staff spoke English, but the customers in the crowded room paid little heed to it. I checked off breakfast choices, including dim sum and doughy pastries, on a card and handed it to the waitress, who returned with tea and hot sauce.
What were the men talking about? I’ll never know what the men smoking by the no smoking sign were talking about, but their conversation was animated and filled with laughter.
------
We returned home today, and after checking e-mail, I perused the local blogs and other usual daily sites, thinking all the while that while it’s a clear case of apples and oranges to compare the range of options and attractions in an immense metropolitan area like Chicago to those in and around Louisville, at the same time, why must we perpetually insist that superstition and backwardness are our best friends?
I’m not speaking here about Scribner Place, Cannon Acres, the City Council, the Mayor, or any of the specific local political topics that have been discussed at NA Confidential since its inception last year.
Rather, with the memory of Chicago’s vibrant neighborhoods and can-do spirit fresh in my mind, I’m referring to the recurring phenomenon hereabouts that currently enjoys its most prominent, and saddest, manifestation in apoplectic opposition to progress in the city of New Albany, an opposition that unfortunately doesn’t confine itself to screaming that present circumstances stand in the way of progress, but that taken together, all past mistakes by any and all politicians and community leaders indicate that we simply can’t do anything right, and should never, ever try.
I am utterly sickened by this cancerous attitude.
Why, if not stemming from unadulterated envy, is it that people who lack the ability to understand insist that their incomprehension is sufficient reason to deny others the opportunity to learn?
Why, if not from simple self-loathing, is it that people take pride in their ignorance, rather than take the steps necessary to gain knowledge?
Why, if not from our own timidity and a respect for fair play that goes far beyond that accorded us in return, should people like these be allowed to use their own lack of imagination and creativity as veto power over varieties of progress that will benefit the remainder of the community?
Of course, these shrieking cyber-punks are not the truly downtrodden, genuinely poverty-stricken, disenfranchised "little people" they so fancifully imagine themselves to be, and since no one else will say it, I will: These "Concern Taxpayers" and "New Albany Residents" don't care one jot for those in this town who really do have it badly.
It's all about tearing down ideas and people that they wrongly perceive to be "above them," not lifting up those they're comfortably sure are below, and even though this is nonsensical at best and repugnant at worst, it's the way it is.
In defense of people like these, it was recently stated elsewhere that they:
“Are not stupid, ignorant, recessive thinking globs of people. (They) are people who happen to have a different opinion, or aren't quite convinced that this (progress) is a good idea.”
Fine.
Readers, if you haven't already done so, go to the pink spitwad blogyard and feel the hatred oozing between the angry words. Consider the anonymity that cloaks it. Remember that its readers support all-American concepts like censorship. Now, ask yourself: What is it that would make these people happy beyond the confines of their own four walls, and the knowledge that not one cent of their taxes went to fund a better community?
It isn't pretty, is it?
In fact, it's often vicious, and goes far beyond reasoned debate and benign disagreement.
Stupid? Ignorant? Recessive (sp – regressive, Laura)?
Their words. Not mine. And if the shoes fit ... then wear them to exit New Albany, like our best and brightest young people continually do, because always standing between them and the remaking of a city in the future tense are the nay-saying Brambleberries, prepared for no sacrifice or gainful efforts of their own beyond that necessary to brutally kneecap progress in any form and preserve their own fiefdoms of futility.
Or, as I've done, you can stay right here and join me in fighting the Luddites every step of the way. To those who have no plan of their own, and want to make sure that progressivism is not allowed to have one, either, because they hate the future just as much as they hate the capable and talented, I've got this to say: you cannot win. You cannot stop the globe from spinning, or the pages of the calendar from turning.
We'd prefer their cooperation in making this city a better place to live, but we're quite prepared to do it without them.
Heh heh. I feel much better now.
But the departures leave two vacancies in the commercial area just inside the beltway on Grant Line Road, near the original location of my own beer and food business. Granted, these could be filled soon, and the overall situation is by no means bad in my Northside neighborhood.
It also could be better, and there doesn't seem to be any firm public plan on the part of local, various economic "development" entities or business owners themselves to improve prospects therein, although getting the Grant Line Road construction project finished certainly helps. To me, the ultimate goal remains connecting IUS with Community Park, and maintaining a locally-owned economy as much as possible in between.
Arguably, matters are far less hopeful on Charlestown Road, roughly between Slate Run Road and Silver Street. There are quite a few commercial vacancies there, especially amid the zombie fast food row by McDonald’s. The ideal solution would be to raze all of it and replant trees, but American capitalism probably precludes such a reason-based course.
A long time ago – 2005, to be exact – when downtown was as yet moribund and revitalization meant anywhere else except here, we returned from a trip to Chicago and it struck me that metro Louisville needed an Asian community like the Windy City’s thriving Chinatown. I looked at the empty buildings downtown and thought, hmm, this looks like a fine place for it; if we can’t do it, I bet the Chinese could. China has the investment capital and the work ethic. Just let ‘em have the buildings, and get out of the way.
Perhaps now that the doughnut hole has moved to Charlestown Road, so has the ideal location of our Chinatown, with Indonesian where the Wendy’s used to be, and Filipino at the old KFC. Colonial Manor could function as NA’s Iroquois, with a grocery as good as ValuMarket. I’m not sure where this leaves Sonic, but we'll figure it out.
Here’s the article I wrote seven years ago. The pink spitwad blogyard has yielded to decaying tabletop linoleum, and while much has been accomplished, much more needs to be done. We might need a Russian oligarch for this.
---
Rog's rant: On the very nature of nay-saying (June 21, 2005)
We spent the weekend in Chicago, and as is the case every time I return home from a trip, it takes a few days to adjust to the state of mind.
The culture shock stands to be a bit greater this time.
Our hotel in Chicago, chosen because it was the cheapest in close proximity to downtown, was located in the heart of Chinatown, one hundred yards from the subway stop and several thousand miles away from just another place to stay.
By this I mean that Chicago’s Chinatown is just that – touristy to an expected degree, but filled to the brim with, well, people from China (and some from Vietnam, Malaysia and other Asian locales). Sometimes none of the voices to be heard are speaking English. It’s easy to catch yourself thinking that you’re somewhere else, not Illinois.
Stand at the right spot, and the aromas of cooking fill the street, emanating from ubiquitous restaurants with dining rooms often tucked away on upper floors, eateries relieving tourists like us of our cash while pulling extra duty as community centers.
Early Sunday morning we entered a bakery and were shooed into the almost hidden rear section, where the satellite television was entirely in Chinese. The staff spoke English, but the customers in the crowded room paid little heed to it. I checked off breakfast choices, including dim sum and doughy pastries, on a card and handed it to the waitress, who returned with tea and hot sauce.
What were the men talking about? I’ll never know what the men smoking by the no smoking sign were talking about, but their conversation was animated and filled with laughter.
------
We returned home today, and after checking e-mail, I perused the local blogs and other usual daily sites, thinking all the while that while it’s a clear case of apples and oranges to compare the range of options and attractions in an immense metropolitan area like Chicago to those in and around Louisville, at the same time, why must we perpetually insist that superstition and backwardness are our best friends?
I’m not speaking here about Scribner Place, Cannon Acres, the City Council, the Mayor, or any of the specific local political topics that have been discussed at NA Confidential since its inception last year.
Rather, with the memory of Chicago’s vibrant neighborhoods and can-do spirit fresh in my mind, I’m referring to the recurring phenomenon hereabouts that currently enjoys its most prominent, and saddest, manifestation in apoplectic opposition to progress in the city of New Albany, an opposition that unfortunately doesn’t confine itself to screaming that present circumstances stand in the way of progress, but that taken together, all past mistakes by any and all politicians and community leaders indicate that we simply can’t do anything right, and should never, ever try.
I am utterly sickened by this cancerous attitude.
Why, if not stemming from unadulterated envy, is it that people who lack the ability to understand insist that their incomprehension is sufficient reason to deny others the opportunity to learn?
Why, if not from simple self-loathing, is it that people take pride in their ignorance, rather than take the steps necessary to gain knowledge?
Why, if not from our own timidity and a respect for fair play that goes far beyond that accorded us in return, should people like these be allowed to use their own lack of imagination and creativity as veto power over varieties of progress that will benefit the remainder of the community?
Of course, these shrieking cyber-punks are not the truly downtrodden, genuinely poverty-stricken, disenfranchised "little people" they so fancifully imagine themselves to be, and since no one else will say it, I will: These "Concern Taxpayers" and "New Albany Residents" don't care one jot for those in this town who really do have it badly.
It's all about tearing down ideas and people that they wrongly perceive to be "above them," not lifting up those they're comfortably sure are below, and even though this is nonsensical at best and repugnant at worst, it's the way it is.
In defense of people like these, it was recently stated elsewhere that they:
“Are not stupid, ignorant, recessive thinking globs of people. (They) are people who happen to have a different opinion, or aren't quite convinced that this (progress) is a good idea.”
Fine.
Readers, if you haven't already done so, go to the pink spitwad blogyard and feel the hatred oozing between the angry words. Consider the anonymity that cloaks it. Remember that its readers support all-American concepts like censorship. Now, ask yourself: What is it that would make these people happy beyond the confines of their own four walls, and the knowledge that not one cent of their taxes went to fund a better community?
It isn't pretty, is it?
In fact, it's often vicious, and goes far beyond reasoned debate and benign disagreement.
Stupid? Ignorant? Recessive (sp – regressive, Laura)?
Their words. Not mine. And if the shoes fit ... then wear them to exit New Albany, like our best and brightest young people continually do, because always standing between them and the remaking of a city in the future tense are the nay-saying Brambleberries, prepared for no sacrifice or gainful efforts of their own beyond that necessary to brutally kneecap progress in any form and preserve their own fiefdoms of futility.
Or, as I've done, you can stay right here and join me in fighting the Luddites every step of the way. To those who have no plan of their own, and want to make sure that progressivism is not allowed to have one, either, because they hate the future just as much as they hate the capable and talented, I've got this to say: you cannot win. You cannot stop the globe from spinning, or the pages of the calendar from turning.
We'd prefer their cooperation in making this city a better place to live, but we're quite prepared to do it without them.
Heh heh. I feel much better now.
Monday, December 24, 2012
REWIND HOLIDAZE EDITION 1: Slovaks and troglodytes.
I've always enjoyed keeping 'em guessing, and so a Beer Money column entitled "Long ago in Slovakia" was published in the pre-merger 'Bune on December 3, 2009. The full text hasn't appeared here until now.
There was an entertaining aftermath, in the form of comments amid a maze of Bledsottian irrelevancies at the blog still called The Voice of the People, which Shirley Baird seems no longer to actively steward (last posting in May, 2012). Back in 2009, I answered the troglodyte's critique here: My visit to PassiveAggressiveLand.
---
Long ago in Slovakia.
My family traces its ethnic roots to Germany, but to this day, I’m unclear as to whether the Christian preferences of my ancestors ran toward Catholic or Protestant. Perhaps there were even unbelievers like me slipping their genes into the mix. If so, they were probably quiet about it.
It used to be that German Catholic immigrants to America celebrated December 6, St. Nicholas Day, as the day for giving gifts. Without a religious upbringing to speak of, St. Nicholas Day made no impression on me until December, 1991. I was living in the city of Kosice, Slovakia, and working as an English teacher. It was my first holiday season spent abroad, and a compelling experience.
Here’s something I wrote at the time.
---
A Christmas Dispatch from Slovakia December, 1991.
There's a good chance of a White Christmas in Slovakia.
The winter's first snow has come and gone, and although we didn't get very much, it was enough to add a cheerful hazard for pedestrians in the forms of sleds, multitudes of them, some of old fashioned wood construction, others of molded plastic. More sleds than I've ever seen have appeared as if by magic from closets and storage rooms, to be pulled by their brightly outfitted young owners and steered at breakneck speed down any and all available slopes, inhabited or otherwise.
They had been charging down the wide sidewalk that leads from Festival Square and ascends the low ridge to the hospital complex where I teach, and the snow on the walkway had been firmly packed into an icy surface that defied sure footing, and the reason I know this is because I was trying to walk up the hill – and failing miserably.
You can't blame the children for failing to understand (or to care about) the consequences of their fun. After all, children don't have as far to fall.
It was a good day for a walk. The snow was fresh and powdery, and it crunched loudly beneath my boots. The white dusting on the cupolas and steeples of the old city brightened the sooty, aging facades. Even the look-alike gray rows of block housing were softened by the white.
The sunshine was bright and surface temperatures no lower than freezing, but a sharp, gusting wind from the north kicked upminiature/a> snow squalls and blew the clothes on the ubiquitous clotheslines into frozen, horizontal positions.
The chill made me think of Russia. The Soviet Union used to be close to Kosice, but now the line on the obsolete map is the border of the infant Ukrainian republic, and who knows the procedure for crossing that border?
Probably a bottle of Scotch and a smile.
The cold flowing into Kosice from Siberia will be as close as I get to Russia this trip, yet I can still see our fur clad, vodka wielding, erstwhile enemies waiting in line for brown bread. It makes me think of the cruel toll of forty years of Cold War: Hunger, homelessness, environmental degradation, social upheaval, rampant violence, the decay of the family, impending economic catastrophe and these are America's spoils of "victory."
In the former U.S.S.R., the situation is even worse.
But Christmas is coming, and somewhere in a valley near Kosice, in the backyard of a quaint farm, a goose is getting fat. Barrels are being inspected to gauge the progress of the cured cabbage that will form the base of the traditional holiday soup. A trip to a nearby town is being planned. There will be shopping for gifts and a visit to the fish market for carp, another holiday staple or perhaps the fish will be vended from oversized plastic tubs, to be weighed and wrapped right on the street.
For an American, there's an eerie quality to the Christmas season in Slovakia. For starters, decorations didn't begin to appear until the first week of December; then again, what can you expect of such an unenlightened country where there's no contrived holiday like Halloween to mark the beginning of the shopping season?
Only a few tasteful, understated window displays are to be seen in the stores, and high ¬pressure, guilt laced sales tactics aren't in evidence at all. Slovakia obviously has much to learn about economics before its people can begin to see the wisdom of centering all hopes on wild overspending at Christmas to keep the economy afloat.
In Slovakia, Santa Claus makes his rounds on the eve of St. Nicholas Day (December 6). Children scrub and polish their shoes and place them on the windowsill to be filled with candy and chocolate, but only if they've been good. If not, they're supposed to receive a bundle of twigs bound together and intended for use to swat their you know what. On Christmas Eve, rumor has it that gifts are not delivered by Santa, but by Jesus himself.
In Communist times the regime attempted to persuade the populace that a chap named Grandfather Frost brought the goodies, presumably on behalf of the benevolent leadership.
There are Christmas trees and caroling in the streets by children, one of whom might carry a representation of the manger, and maybe the singers will be rewarded for their efforts with fruit and cookies.
In short, despite tight economic times and a full list of daunting problems to be solved, the holiday season in Slovakia is proceeding according to schedule and tradition. I've been given a bottle of homemade peach brandy for St. Nicholas Day; the doctor who gave it to me instructed me to make a Christmas Eve toast to peace, health and a good harvest. On a cold day, with steaming sauerkraut soup just around the comer, the toast strikes me as a true and noble thought.
There was an entertaining aftermath, in the form of comments amid a maze of Bledsottian irrelevancies at the blog still called The Voice of the People, which Shirley Baird seems no longer to actively steward (last posting in May, 2012). Back in 2009, I answered the troglodyte's critique here: My visit to PassiveAggressiveLand.
---
Long ago in Slovakia.
My family traces its ethnic roots to Germany, but to this day, I’m unclear as to whether the Christian preferences of my ancestors ran toward Catholic or Protestant. Perhaps there were even unbelievers like me slipping their genes into the mix. If so, they were probably quiet about it.
It used to be that German Catholic immigrants to America celebrated December 6, St. Nicholas Day, as the day for giving gifts. Without a religious upbringing to speak of, St. Nicholas Day made no impression on me until December, 1991. I was living in the city of Kosice, Slovakia, and working as an English teacher. It was my first holiday season spent abroad, and a compelling experience.
Here’s something I wrote at the time.
---
A Christmas Dispatch from Slovakia December, 1991.
There's a good chance of a White Christmas in Slovakia.
The winter's first snow has come and gone, and although we didn't get very much, it was enough to add a cheerful hazard for pedestrians in the forms of sleds, multitudes of them, some of old fashioned wood construction, others of molded plastic. More sleds than I've ever seen have appeared as if by magic from closets and storage rooms, to be pulled by their brightly outfitted young owners and steered at breakneck speed down any and all available slopes, inhabited or otherwise.
They had been charging down the wide sidewalk that leads from Festival Square and ascends the low ridge to the hospital complex where I teach, and the snow on the walkway had been firmly packed into an icy surface that defied sure footing, and the reason I know this is because I was trying to walk up the hill – and failing miserably.
You can't blame the children for failing to understand (or to care about) the consequences of their fun. After all, children don't have as far to fall.
It was a good day for a walk. The snow was fresh and powdery, and it crunched loudly beneath my boots. The white dusting on the cupolas and steeples of the old city brightened the sooty, aging facades. Even the look-alike gray rows of block housing were softened by the white.
The sunshine was bright and surface temperatures no lower than freezing, but a sharp, gusting wind from the north kicked up
The chill made me think of Russia. The Soviet Union used to be close to Kosice, but now the line on the obsolete map is the border of the infant Ukrainian republic, and who knows the procedure for crossing that border?
Probably a bottle of Scotch and a smile.
The cold flowing into Kosice from Siberia will be as close as I get to Russia this trip, yet I can still see our fur clad, vodka wielding, erstwhile enemies waiting in line for brown bread. It makes me think of the cruel toll of forty years of Cold War: Hunger, homelessness, environmental degradation, social upheaval, rampant violence, the decay of the family, impending economic catastrophe and these are America's spoils of "victory."
In the former U.S.S.R., the situation is even worse.
But Christmas is coming, and somewhere in a valley near Kosice, in the backyard of a quaint farm, a goose is getting fat. Barrels are being inspected to gauge the progress of the cured cabbage that will form the base of the traditional holiday soup. A trip to a nearby town is being planned. There will be shopping for gifts and a visit to the fish market for carp, another holiday staple or perhaps the fish will be vended from oversized plastic tubs, to be weighed and wrapped right on the street.
For an American, there's an eerie quality to the Christmas season in Slovakia. For starters, decorations didn't begin to appear until the first week of December; then again, what can you expect of such an unenlightened country where there's no contrived holiday like Halloween to mark the beginning of the shopping season?
Only a few tasteful, understated window displays are to be seen in the stores, and high ¬pressure, guilt laced sales tactics aren't in evidence at all. Slovakia obviously has much to learn about economics before its people can begin to see the wisdom of centering all hopes on wild overspending at Christmas to keep the economy afloat.
In Slovakia, Santa Claus makes his rounds on the eve of St. Nicholas Day (December 6). Children scrub and polish their shoes and place them on the windowsill to be filled with candy and chocolate, but only if they've been good. If not, they're supposed to receive a bundle of twigs bound together and intended for use to swat their you know what. On Christmas Eve, rumor has it that gifts are not delivered by Santa, but by Jesus himself.
In Communist times the regime attempted to persuade the populace that a chap named Grandfather Frost brought the goodies, presumably on behalf of the benevolent leadership.
There are Christmas trees and caroling in the streets by children, one of whom might carry a representation of the manger, and maybe the singers will be rewarded for their efforts with fruit and cookies.
In short, despite tight economic times and a full list of daunting problems to be solved, the holiday season in Slovakia is proceeding according to schedule and tradition. I've been given a bottle of homemade peach brandy for St. Nicholas Day; the doctor who gave it to me instructed me to make a Christmas Eve toast to peace, health and a good harvest. On a cold day, with steaming sauerkraut soup just around the comer, the toast strikes me as a true and noble thought.
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
2 - More bad news for New Albany's troglodytes: You're not getting any brighter.
Mitt Romney's 14 percentage point margin of victory in Floyd County indicates that the southward slide (how's THAT for appropriate imagery) is devolving more quickly here. Note that our neighbors to the west, Perry County, went for Barack Obama by 12 points. Note also the conclusion: Education makes the inexorable plunge more tolerable. Someone best send a memo to Tony Bennett, who is about to leave his heart in Indianapolis.
Is pampered humanity getting steadily less intelligent? Humans reached a peak of intelligence more than 2,000 years ago and it's been downhill ever since, a scientist speculates, by Ian Sample, science correspondent at The Guardian
Since modern humans emerged from the evolutionary brambles of our ancient ancestry, our bodies and minds have been transforming under the pressures of natural and sexual selection. But what of human intelligence? Has our cognitive ability risen steadily since our forebears knapped the first stone tools? Or are our smartest days behind us?
Gerald Crabtree, a geneticist at Stanford University in California, bets on the latter. He believes that if an average Greek from 1,000 BC were transported to modern times, he or she would be one of the brightest among us. Our intellectual prowess has probably been sliding south since the invention of farming and the rise of high-density living that it allowed, he claims.
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