By Elvis Eromosele
There is a familiar refrain that echoes across generations: our grandparents were smarter than our parents; our parents were smarter than us; and our children, glued to their phones, must surely be the dullest of all. Every era seems convinced that intelligence peaked just before it arrived and has been on a steady decline ever since.
Our grandparents often spoke with quiet authority. They survived scarcity, built families with little formal education, and navigated life with practical wisdom. To them, endurance was intelligence. Knowing when to plant, when to save, when to speak and when to remain silent was proof of sense. Their knowledge was forged by necessity, not convenience.
Our parents inherited that worldview and added structure to it. They embraced formal education, discipline, and order. They told us, often bluntly, that we lacked sense. We asked too many questions, challenged authority, and wanted things easier. In reminding us of our “deficiencies,” they were also affirming their own competence. After all, they believed they had worked harder, struggled more, and therefore knew better.
Now we look at our children and repeat the cycle. We see heads bent over glowing screens, fingers flying across keyboards, attention fractured between multiple apps. We conclude, almost instinctively, that they cannot be as smart as we were. How can anyone learn anything while scrolling endlessly? we ask. How can wisdom come from memes, short videos, and emojis?
Yet here lies the contradiction.
Despite every generation believing the next is less intelligent, the most groundbreaking innovations keep coming from the so-called “dumber” generation. The technologies reshaping our world, artificial intelligence, blockchain, digital finance, social platforms, and renewable energy solutions, are largely imagined, built, and refined by people younger than those criticising them. The very devices we accuse of dulling their minds are the tools with which they are reinventing reality.
This suggests a deeper truth: intelligence does not disappear; it changes form.
Our grandparents were smart in survival. Our parents were smart in structure. We were smart in adaptation. Our children are smart in connection, speed, and synthesis. Each generation solves the problems of its time using the tools available to it. What looks like a distraction to one generation may be an exploration to another. What looks like laziness may be efficiency. What looks like disrespect may simply be independence of thought.
The mistake we keep making is measuring new intelligence with old rulers. We expect wisdom to sound the same, look the same, and behave the same across decades. When it doesn’t, we call it inferior. But history shows that progress has always come from those willing to think differently, not those determined to think traditionally.
Ironically, every generation benefits from the innovations of the next while complaining about its habits. We enjoy instant communication but criticise social media. We rely on digital navigation but mock those who cannot read paper maps. We celebrate innovation but distrust the innovators.
Perhaps the real question is not whether the younger generation is smart enough, but whether we are wise enough to recognise intelligence when it no longer looks like ours.
The change we see today is not the product of a dumber generation. It is the outcome of a different kind of intelligence, one shaped by a faster world, more information, and fewer boundaries. And just as our parents underestimated us, and their parents underestimated them, we may one day realise that the future was being built quietly on screens we dismissed as distractions.
Eromosele, a corporate communications expert and sustainability advocate, wrote via: elviseroms@gmail.com
