According to the article they have been taught how to do it, in the first and second grades (ages 6-7 in US schools). They just haven't used that skill for a long time and have lost that skill.
We got taught in first and second grade, reading maps and navigating by them included. Was neccessity for Schnitzeljagd and other scavenger hunt-type games. But, to be fair, most kids already knew how to read timepieces.
Bullshit. Information is everywhere, if they WANTED to learn how to read them they could go on wikipedia or youtube.
That excuse could've worked when I was a teenager, where to learn something you have to either learn it from a person or from a book, but not nowadays.
Is learning how to read an analogue clock really an effective use of one's time? I myself was taught how an am able to read an analogue clock, but I doubt that I would be much worse off without that abulity.
For knowledge you only use occasionally and always in a context where reference (conventional or AI) is available, why not? That frees up memory/resources to learn more important stuff, the stuff where consulting reference might be too slow or not available.
Do you know how to use a fountain pen? Do you know how to tell your position by the stars? Do you know how to start a fire with sticks and stones? Life's too short to spend it hoarding trivia.
Children need instruction, they’re not born with an inbuilt list of things they should probably learn and the desire to go and learn them without guidance.
If we were talking about 6 year olds I wouldn't made this comment. Plenty of teenagers are curious about the world around them. The ones that can't read a clock, aren't. By the time people get to their teens there's already a huge huge range of interests and yes, IQ too.
Of course they /can/ read clocks. You just haven't _taught_ them how to do it yet, and up until now, they've had no reason to do it.
It's divisive and weird.