Quote:A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Maybe that's a sign of the dumbing down of America - I wouldn't know.


It's pretty obvious to most people that 'rocket surgery' is a deliberate play on words that combines 'rocket science' and 'brain surgery'. It dates back to at least 1994, where it's used in a short story written by someone apparently working at Intel (one of the places they probably are qualified for rocket surgery...) and in an article in the New York Times.


It's a form of linguistic wordplay that requires you to understand the rules to break them. It's not dumbing down.