More generally, this method of interacting with the most simplified interpretation of science and then criticizing its simplicity isn't useful to the criticizer or the criticized.

Their recentish coverage of lead in foods is a bit embarrassing though, since they used a California standard for dosage limits that even the EU would blush at.

[1] https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Febs0000374

[1] https://acm-stoc.org/stoc2025/accepted-papers.html

Disclaimer: most people do not think "Machiavellian" is a flattering descriptor

Maybe I'm missing the joke, but isn't IQ meant to follow a normal distribution with a mean/median of 100 with a standard deviation of 15, in which case you'd expect half of jurors to be below 100 and ~15% to be above 115, which is pretty close to what you've seen?

The ancient (and even, as you point out, very slightly pre-modern) world had a lot of "infrastructure" in place to deal with this, there were rituals and ceremonies and familiar people who knew what you were going through, and most of that is gone now.

It is indeed an enormous change.

[1] https://seer.cancer.gov/statfacts/html/pancreas.html

Also, circulating particularly weird dissertations for the express purpose of angering people has gotten a lot more rewarding

IMO the confident Tweets about how to become a good researcher and hire good researchers look pretty weird next to the lack of any apparent research papers (or even visible research products) five years later.