Why doctors are not as clever as they used to be

Why doctors are not as clever as they used to be

www.dailymail.co.uk

Leading professionals are becoming less intelligent, researchers said yesterday. Lawyers, doctors, accountants and bankers were all cleverer a generation ago, a study found.

...places [in higher educaton, since the 1970s] were filled by those from wealthier families - who were not always as naturally gifted.

Researchers from Bristol University based their findings on IQ tests...they found a decline in IQ among those in the best-rewarded and highest-status professions between 2 generations

(visit the link for the full news article)

Well, this bears out my own anecdotal feelings about things...the truly "best and brightest" are alluered by the prospects of finance, where they put their big brains and elite deplomas to work draining granny's pension fund and generally drinking everyone's milkshake.

The business and even professional worlds have also become more nepotistic and based on "connections" than meritocracy or simple talent.

www.dailymail.co.uk
(visit the link for the full news article)

The United States is quickly on it's way to developing a class war. We've always had a rich class in this country but since the 1970s we've seen a rise in the price of education and direct attack on the middle and lower classes in terms of financial freedom and living standards. With the rise in population and the removal of opportunity, only the ones at the top are going to get the prestigious jobs at the top, much like feudalism. My generation is pretty much #ed, but the American dream has been dead for awhile.

I heard a news briefing the other day that there is a huge problem in Britain where the privelaged get the jobs and the lower classes have almost no opportunity to get these positions.

Is that true?

Originally posted by silent thunder


Well, this bears out my own anecdotal feelings about things...the truly "best and brightest" are alluered by the prospects of finance, where they put their big brains and elite deplomas to work draining granny's pension fund and generally drinking everyone's milkshake.

Well according to your article bankers are stupider too. So I guess the smarter didn't go to investment banking. Then again, basing the research on IQ tests is pretty stupid.

Doesn't sound as if doctors are now slobbering neanderthals

In the US, we have gone from the cerebral excitement of science and engineering majors, following the advent of space exploration, to financial excitement of majors in business and law. Follow the money the past 30 years. Free market place of careers.

Combine the rush away from science, math, and engineering (save for computer engineering, which has been increasingly outsourced anyway) to finance careers, with an increasingly religious fundamentalist culture with little use for science but a need for Bible College graduates (draining off talent from other areas), the US is becoming bankrupt of the types of talent it needs to pull out of the current economic crisis. Ready to get into green technology? I have serious doubts.

With middle class citizens increasingly resorting to lower income service sector jobs since the 1980's, it is little wonder the middle class is shrinking and we're in the current economic downturn. Blame it on other "bubbles", but the real bubble that burst was the middle class high wages gained after WW2. That really is the bubble that set off the other bubbles. "It's the jobs, stupid."

Unless there is a concerted national effort of encouragement and support, with tuition paid, eg., US brainpower will go untapped. In fact, perhaps tapping brainpower to solve problems in green technology is our only viable future, not tapping oil wells.

From my point of view, all that intelligence has been shifted over to the financial sector where the brains have concocted all sorts of ways to swindle folks out of their money. Mind you, the people having their wallets emptied aren't all that bright, unfortunately, but it takes a clever scheme to garner attention and, in the end, profit.

And as far as doctors go, well they're not all that different than the financiers. The only difference is that they're the pawns of good ole big pharmacy. The well being of many doctors' businesses are reliant on pushing drugs. The more they prescribe the bigger the payoff. Who cares if the patients suffer as a result as long as the profit is there.

What a wonderful frigging world we live in, eh?

reply to post by silent thunder


I am stunned at the lack of knowledge my doctor has, or the others in that office. They rely on the computer to tell them what is going on, entering the symptoms and waiting on an answer. I was suffering terribly with a skin condition that began after a bug bite. Intially the computer was telling them to treat me with benadryl, then an epi shot, another epi shot, a third epi shot, then they didn't have a clue. I went home after the third office visit (300.00 worth of visits by the way) and through the wonder of google, I found out what was happening. I had a rare condition call dermotographism. I went back to the doctor with my printed findings, and wala, I was right, now I get the right treatment.

Originally posted by John_Q_Llama
From my point of view, all that intelligence has been shifted over to the financial sector where the brains have concocted all sorts of ways to swindle folks out of their money. Mind you, the people having their wallets emptied aren't all that bright, unfortunately, but it takes a clever scheme to garner attention and, in the end, profit.

There is no doubt that many smart kids aspire to go to Wall Street now more than ever before because of promises of riches and glamour But your view is very simplistic. If you read the article it states that other areas of occupations such as writing and nursing has increased in intelligence. This could mean that people are doing things that they 'want' to do rather than what is 'expected' of them.

Not to mention, your total lumping of the whole financial sector into an elaborate scheme to take money is pretty foolish. Sure there are shady networks in the world of finance as there is in health, government, acting, writing, science/tech. But that doesn't mean that all of those things are USELESS. Finance actually does serve a purpose you know...it isn't just a casino even though many people treat it like that (but that is what makes the world go around )

reply to post by RetinoidReceptor


You make a good point. I wasn't meaning to stereotype an entire industry. Thanks for bringing that to my attention.

All I was trying to get across was that there has been a lot of questionable business conducted in the finance sector and the result has put a lot of people tough situations. If people weren't so quick to peddle easy credit in various forms, along with the resulting debt (especially if people aren't good at managing their money), that would certainly go a long way in improving things.

Dunno about being dumbed down - they've simply been rolled up and controlled like so many other professions

Most GPs I've encountered recently, seem incapable of dealing with anything that doesn't require Panadol or penicillin. Anything that jumps up on their computer screens that indicates a condition beyond this, seems to get referred immediately to a "specialist" who then requires you to see a range of allied health professionals before they deign to give you an appointment.

"Go see this physiotherapist, pathologist, occupational therapist, dietician, psychologist and maybe a veterinarian and let them have their bite of the medical money bikkie before you you come and see me. That way I get a kickback from them as well as a new laptop from the pharmaceutical company after I see you for five minutes and change your brand of antibiotic"

When you've got Big Pharma providing all the information you need to practise, you don't need a high IQ. Which is why so many medical courses are emphasising interpersonal skills these days - a good dose of customer service is better for the bottom line than the ability to locate an enlarged spleen.

I'd suggest watching Idiocracy with Luke Wilson, it's a comedy but it tends to make wonder what if world slowly had a decrease in intelligence.

I know the last time I saw a doctor he misdiagnosed a broken ankle... He said it WAS broken!!! - it wasn't.

Now I know the ankle is a complicated joint but in all honesty I seriously consider if I actually want to talk to a doctor now a days, who knows what minor misdiagnosis could lead to life changing mistakes?

reply to post by Now_Then


This is just another repercussion - the powerful people are wrecking the planet.

The poor kids just can't get into the fields where they are needed.

This leads to desperation and bitterness, and then rebellion (by these kids).

There never should have been a price put on education - education is the future of mankind.

If you are driven into a certain field, that is where you belong, and yet those who control the planet are wrecking everyone's lives - the ones who want to help and the ones who need help.

In the end, they are wrecking their own lives too, but costing humanity its own existence.

Until we can overthrow these people, everyone is doomed.

Originally posted by space cadet
reply to post by silent thunder

 

I am stunned at the lack of knowledge my doctor has, or the others in that office. They rely on the computer to tell them what is going on, entering the symptoms and waiting on an answer. I was suffering terribly with a skin condition that began after a bug bite. Intially the computer was telling them to treat me with benadryl, then an epi shot, another epi shot, a third epi shot, then they didn't have a clue. I went home after the third office visit (300.00 worth of visits by the way) and through the wonder of google, I found out what was happening. I had a rare condition call dermotographism. I went back to the doctor with my printed findings, and wala, I was right, now I get the right treatment.

Yes, I've seen stuff like that too. The doctors spout out what they're supposed to. Last week when my daughter was having her physical to get back into public school, the doctor was pressuring me to have her injected with gardasil. I refused, and she demanded to know why. I told her why, and she told me what I was saying was a lie, that the shots are perfectly safe, and no one has gotten sick from them other than soreness at the injection site.

My daughter was forced to get three shots anyway though to get into school this year. She had been up to date on her shots until adulthood, but the health department lost her records for the past six years and they made her get some of them again. I've been pretty ticked about it. I've been unemployed for several months now, the savings is being drained, and she'll at least have free lunch at the school. She had been homeschooled for the past couple years.

I think more and more of the doctors are brainwashed.