I do find contemporary museums a dumbed-down bore. Only the iceberg tip
of most collections are on view and the bulk of the space is given over
to giant "Gee-Whiz, Water is Wet!" exhibits. The assumption seems to be
that the typical museum visitor is only as bright as a twenty-watt
bulb. That is not true, and visitors who are that dim aren't going to
learn anything despite all the 12-foot tall giant ears and force-fed
monosyllabic interpretations with lift-the-flap quizzes. People bring
their kids out of a sense of obligation, but by and large adults are
bored.
I'll take something like the Cambridge Peabody's victorian collections
over giant rubber models any day.