>>11364202Yeah, I feel like there's basically two things happening simultaneously.
1, people vastly overestimate the threshold IQ for success in these fields. Certainly if you want to be a superstar within the field it's helpful to have a significantly above average IQ, but to be a decent student at an average school doesn't really require some incredibly above average intelligence in the age of Chegg and free internet tutoring and almost guaranteed curving.
2, I think standards in many fields have exponentially dropped in response to so many of the fields becoming so interdisciplinary. To prepare a student for the modern market place you basically just give them a very wide veneer of education where you just barely gloss the surface of whatever variety of sub-fields are available. You generally don't get to the point where a lot of stem majors require any sort of a brain beyond average until you get to junior/senior year when you need to dive hard into whatever sub-field you wish to pursue research wise, and a lot of people don't even do that and just take whatever is easiest for the grades regardless of depth of material.
