So humans were once on that big brain philosophical and now they are on that small brain special needs stuff?

Civilization tends to take care of its citizens so much that what I call human trash tends to accumulate in it eventually leading to its downfall. Then natural selection takes back over and kills off the stupid and after the survives have to rebuild civilization all over again and the cycle repeats.
This is why civilizations throughout history rises and falls in cycles. Natural selection would normally kill off the stupid but civilization coddles them until the stupid eventually end civilization. What I'm going to call the Idiocracy Era happens just before the fall.

The late 18C became known as the Age of the Enlightment, a huge flowering of the sciences, arts, etc.; and sidelining of much of the ignorance, superstition and mere guesswork of the past.

I wonder if the early 21C will become known as the Age of the Ignorant - by rancid ignorance and division overshadowing the enlightened.

Yes, the devolution is real.

Institionalized