11 Mar 2009 - Medical News Today reports that a study (quoted below) has discovered a link between the age of the father and the intelligence of the child. The study concludes that the older the father, the lower the standard of a child's (up to 7 years) performance on cognitive tests.
"Advanced Paternal Age Is Associated with Impaired Neurocognitive Outcomes during Infancy and Childhood."Bullies the world over rejoiced today as the potential for creative and novel snide remarks dawned upon them. For example, the incompetent colleague can be issued with a, "I see that your father must be about 200 years older than you" to put the point across - with scientific evidence that qualifies the statement, to boot. Similarly, for the moron who couldn't care less about others, a quip of "it must have been difficult to be born to a senior citizen" will hit the nail on the head.Saha S, Barnett AG, Foldi C, Burne TH, Eyles DW, Buka SL, McGrath JJ.
PLoS Medicine Vol. 6, No. 3, e40. Published online March 10, 2009 doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.1000040
Practitioners of sarcasm advised though to wait until the results of the study have propogated well into the homes of the intended recipients before employing such comments. And for those who cannot wait, it would be wise to include a link to this study and report for the intended target to refer to when making such retorts.
It remains to be seen how well this vein of insult will take to the masses, but with the clear advantage of being able to insult both the target AND his/her father at one go, observers believe it could very well be a winner.
2 comments:
Correlation doesn't necessary mean causation. There may be external reasons, apart from age, that cause the observed decrease in intelligence.
For example, a toxic environment could have effect on sperm quality, and the older the person, the lower the quality. This would not necessarily mean that age, per se, is the reason for the phenomena. If someone has aged in a clean environment, the correlation might disappear.
There may also be sociological reasons for intelligence decrease. Perhaps older parents bring up their children differently from younger parents? Perhaps their diets are different? Etc etc.
(Yes, you can train to improve the IQ, which means that upbringing and education may be an as important factor as genetics.)
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