This is not a problem. Anti-intellectualism is the problem. Our culture encourages people not to be smart. In a sentiment captured by Marco Rubio when he said it is better to be a welder than a philosopher, we teach young people that non-intellectual pursuits are more noble (so long as they make money). We teach men that it is more manly to work with your hands. We teach women that service-sector jobs, or jobs that require more social acumen are more womanly. We teach people the false-dichotomy of left-right-brain dominance, making it easy believe that one is simply unequipped for logic and quantitative mental work. We teach black youth that their role models should be athletes and pop-stars, not people successful in STEM-fields (personal experience). Our popular culture characterizes smart people as weird, eccentric, and disconnected from the rest of humanity -- those tropes are obvious in the article's examples of "Big Bang" and Sherlock Holmes.
When my wife learned coding, all her old college girlfriends were amazed that she turned out to be so "smart". She was shocked, as she never saw herself as particularly smart (though she is), successfully learning to code is just a function of putting in the practice. It became apparent that her friends were socialized to believe that this coding was the exclusive domain of this mythical class of brainy people.
Sure some people are naturally smarter, thus it is relatively easier for them to do mentally laborious work. However, If the economy increasing favors people who can carry a heavier mental workload, then the first step to preparing citizens for participating in that economy is overcoming our culture's resistant strain of anti-intellectualism.
This is not a problem. Anti-intellectualism is the problem. Our culture encourages people not to be smart. In a sentiment captured by Marco Rubio when he said it is better to be a welder than a philosopher, we teach young people that non-intellectual pursuits are more noble (so long as they make money). We teach men that it is more manly to work with your hands. We teach women that service-sector jobs, or jobs that require more social acumen are more womanly. We teach people the false-dichotomy of left-right-brain dominance, making it easy believe that one is simply unequipped for logic and quantitative mental work. We teach black youth that their role models should be athletes and pop-stars, not people successful in STEM-fields (personal experience). Our popular culture characterizes smart people as weird, eccentric, and disconnected from the rest of humanity -- those tropes are obvious in the article's examples of "Big Bang" and Sherlock Holmes.
When my wife learned coding, all her old college girlfriends were amazed that she turned out to be so "smart". She was shocked, as she never saw herself as particularly smart (though she is), successfully learning to code is just a function of putting in the practice. It became apparent that her friends were socialized to believe that this coding was the exclusive domain of this mythical class of brainy people.
Sure some people are naturally smarter, thus it is relatively easier for them to do mentally laborious work. However, If the economy increasing favors people who can carry a heavier mental workload, then the first step to preparing citizens for participating in that economy is overcoming our culture's resistant strain of anti-intellectualism.