I don't know if the current generation is more intellectually lazy than previous generations. After all, how many of us have read through a complete list of "great books" like the 60-volume Great Books of the Western World? We may have read more of them than the youngsters but who is to say the one's we missed are no longer important or the one's we read are still important or the differing books our children read are not important?

I think the problem is that the skills needed in each generation are different. When I grew up, search meant physically flipping through a card catalog or scanning printed indices. Cut and paste was done through cutting and pasting and was only of importance in publishing. Few people other than secretaries knew how to type. Now, online search, cut and pasted mashups, and keyboarding are considered basic skills.

As far as programming, it's really only of use to programmers. However, at its core, it is based on two things that I feel everyone should study - Boolean algebra and set theory. My secondary education touched on the second and I didn't even hear of the first until I went to college. Now they are part of my sons' core middle school math curriculum.