[germinalphrase]

A counter argument (made by Alan Kay and others) is that the language complexity of what people read is reducing which is leading to a return to an oral culture rather than literate culture (to our collective detriment). My anecdotal experience as a high school English teacher leads me to say this feels true.

[npilk]

It’s been a while since I read the book, but I think Johnson had hypothesized that more modern reading experiences (e.g. browsing the Internet) might require more context switching and mental processing than traditional written formats like a newspaper. Granted, he wrote the book in 2005, but I do think memes and other internet-native forms of content are challenging in new and different ways.

[svnt]

Who are the others? I would like to read more about this.

[leonroy]

A few years back a comparitive analysis was made of past president's vocabularies and their grade level: https://www.newsweek.com/trump-fire-and-fury-smart-genius-ob...

Politics aside it does seem that presidents have been pitching their language lower and lower to appeal to a broader audience. I recall reading about how Obama simplified the vocabulary of his speeches from college level to 10th grade, to 4th grade to 2nd grade: https://smartpolitics.lib.umn.edu/2010/01/29/professor-obama... https://smartpolitics.lib.umn.edu/2011/01/27/keeping-it-simp...

On the flip side though George Washington's first inaugaral address goes to the other extreme where it's impenetrably verbose: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/10/have-pr...

Anecdata at this point but I fear the OP might be right - we are simplifying our language over time.