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by asdlfj2sd33 6178 days ago
Exactly. When you compare youtube comments to anything written 100 years ago you must be tempted to think we've gotten A LOT stupider.

But what you have to realize is, that 100 years ago most people couldn't even read or write. But today they are making youtube comments - progress!
2 comments
eru 6177 days ago
> But what you have to realize is, that 100 years ago most people couldn't even read or write.

You mean, globally? In the industrialised nations, people were quite literate in 1909. Especially in the USA with all the emphasis on bible reading.

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quellhorst 6178 days ago
The Internet used to be mostly filled with intellectuals and I thought people here were much smarter than the general population I encountered. Today the net is a cesspool.
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sketerpot 6178 days ago
That's an awfully broad statement, don't you think? The Internet used to be an area with a higher-than-normal density of intellectuals, and now you can only say that about some parts of the Internet. But please don't lump it all together as if there was some sort of equivalence between (say) Hacker News and 4chan and Christian Youth Forums and YouTube and the Energy from Thorium forum.

If the net is a cesspool, then so is the entire world.

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quellhorst 6177 days ago
Sure, but those bright stars like hacker news eventually burn out too. Hopefully it doesn't happen too quickly.
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kragen 6178 days ago
Oh hey, I didn't even know about the Energy from Thorium blog; there's a forum too? Is it good or bad?
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