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Posted: 11/21/2023 7:44:57 AM EDT
[#1]
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Posted: 11/21/2023 7:50:06 AM EDT
[#2]
Quoted: I believe that modern man has had generations of mental growth throughout our brief existence. Why would I listen to the ancient word of any man from millennia ago? We joke about Idiocracy being a self-fulfilling fantasy, but I believe we get smarter the longer we’ve been on this earth. The least intelligent have the most children, thus we get dumber. For evolution to work, a selective force must be in action, not much of that these days. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 7:55:17 AM EDT
[#3]
Quote HistoryQuoted: IQ was higher in the Victorian age 100+ years ago. @Paul_Sothern Kinda puts Woodley at odds with Flynn. Also may speak more to methodology and lack of controls or the specific situation in Britain over time than anything. The analysis is less than conclusive. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 7:57:09 AM EDT
[#4]
Quote HistoryQuoted: The penalty for stupidity as recently as two hundred years ago was usually a painful and violent death. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 8:03:16 AM EDT
[#5]
I don't subscribe to chronological arrogance.
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Posted: 11/21/2023 8:06:34 AM EDT
[#6]
intelligence
Depends more upon how it's measured and who determines what it is. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 8:08:23 AM EDT
[#7]
Quote HistoryQuoted: Wrong, Marcus Aurelius held a crumbling empire together with nothing but the strength of his will. Do you think ANY American politician today has that capacity. There are none with the integrity to do it. ETA: Maybe our society would seem more intelligent if we didn’t celebrate failed cultures and malign successful cultures… |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 8:12:24 AM EDT
[#8]
Quote HistoryQuoted: We have much higher IQ than 100 years ago. Why? People of even 100 years ago had to work all day to provide for the next day. They didn't have time to be a thinker and develop abstract thinking. Modern society allows thinkers to be thinkers. Thinkers don't have to spend their time working in the fields to make sure the harvest is in time for winter. Modern society allows far more thinkers to find a mate and pass on their intellectual genes. Socrates' definition of the "Philosopher King". I wonder how he would react. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 8:16:00 AM EDT
[#9]
Quote HistoryQuoted: I’m always amused when “intelligent” posters forget something the Eugenics movement demonstrated when the genius idea of breeding geniuses lead to average intelligent offspring: regression to the mean. Granted, the studies were small, but breed 2 genius athletes & you will not reliably produce Kahn Noonien Singh as often as you might get Billy Bob Schleprock, who’s content to work 3rd shift at Walmart & live in the trailer park, even with all the advantages the parents offer in rearing said child. Quote HistoryQuoted: Quoted: Galileo, DaVinci, Isaac Newton, Aristotle, Archimedes, Socrates, Euclid, Pythagoras, Plato, Copernicus, Beethoven, Michelangelo, Pascal, Gauss, Kepler, etc, etc say "Hold my beer". Perhaps OP meant that our species collectively knows more than we used to. If there has been a general increase in individual IQ's there's darn little evidence of that. Much more to the contrary it would appear. I’m always amused when “intelligent” posters forget something the Eugenics movement demonstrated when the genius idea of breeding geniuses lead to average intelligent offspring: regression to the mean. Granted, the studies were small, but breed 2 genius athletes & you will not reliably produce Kahn Noonien Singh as often as you might get Billy Bob Schleprock, who’s content to work 3rd shift at Walmart & live in the trailer park, even with all the advantages the parents offer in rearing said child. Ashkenazi Jews say hello. Regression to the mean is a real thing, but it doesn't mean intelligence isn't heritable (it is). Your athlete example is also poor/incorrect. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 8:17:03 AM EDT
[#10]
Ha! Some people have become more knowledgeable, but for the most part they"re idiots. Take away modern conveniences and infrastructure, and most would die in short order from exposure, starvation, and disease.
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Posted: 11/21/2023 8:18:58 AM EDT
[#11]
Quote HistoryQuoted: Plato, Socrates, Aristotle, Shakespeare, Milton, authors of the books of the Bible, Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, builders of the great cathedrals and castles in Europe - MORONS! Add Sumerians, Babylonians and others who studied the heavens and calculated the movement of the planets.....bunch of dumbasses if there ever were any |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 8:25:46 AM EDT
[#12]
Quoted: I believe that modern man has had generations of mental growth throughout our brief existence. Why would I listen to the ancient word of any man from millennia ago? We joke about Idiocracy being a self-fulfilling fantasy, but I believe we get smarter the longer we’ve been on this earth. Wow |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 8:27:24 AM EDT
[#13]
Hell. Just understanding nutrition will have a big impact.
Nutrients can help or hinder brain development. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 8:33:55 AM EDT
[#14]
Quote HistoryQuoted: Add Sumerians, Babylonians and others who studied the heavens and calculated the movement of the planets.....bunch of dumbasses if there ever were any |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 8:45:28 AM EDT
[#15]
Our ancestors were definitely "smarter" in a practical and more well rounded sense, and maybe a bit more aware. It's also important to remember a far more significant percentage of their population was sloshed or buzzing 24/7 because per-industrial revolution plain water was more of a health hazard than adding some amount of alcohol to everything.
Currently humans are also far more specialized in obscure or esoteric disciplines but probably can't change the tire on their car. Most people today would likely be considered "touched" or autistic by our ancestor's standards. Our massive population is what allows this specialization and division of labor, which in turn allows technological growth and invention. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 9:22:59 AM EDT
[#16]
Quote HistoryQuoted: OP’s premise is based on intellectual homogeneity. The reality is that we have fewer thinkers, innovators and doers but more moochers, looters and useless people being enabled by technology. The fact that you pulled that word out of your brain is proof. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 9:33:32 AM EDT
[#17]
The chronological snobbery is strong with this one. It’s a dangerous sort of pride. Man is progressing and has to be smarter than those who came before him. Access to technology does not mean an increase in intelligence.
I will say I’m a bit of an odd man out here. Chronological snobbery makes sense if you believe your ancestors crawled out of pond scum and kept processing. I would say it might be the only logical choice. I believe on the other hand that man was made in the image of God and that the nature of man hasn’t changed. We are the same people who are capable of immense good and horrify evil… stunning beauty and disgusting filth… unending creativity and utter destruction. Not recognizing that dual nature, as well as the wisdom and intelligence that came before us, is a major step along the path in repeating the most egregious mistakes of those who came before us. It’s been a slippery slope of evil for many who have come before us… even within modern history. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 9:38:46 AM EDT
[#18]
Quoted: I believe that modern man has had generations of mental growth throughout our brief existence. Why would I listen to the ancient word of any man from millennia ago? We joke about Idiocracy being a self-fulfilling fantasy, but I believe we get smarter the longer we’ve been on this earth. I disagree, overall, the higher % of college educated citizens a country has, the dumber their population, as a huge % of college experience teaches dumbass shit, resulting in smug people who feel smart, but tend to be far from iy, ir highly technical smart, but zero common sense, or grasp of basic shit, and filled with propaganda and useless woke beliefs. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 10:19:00 AM EDT
[#19]
We have all the worlds information and knowledge at our finger tips . Yet the least time of practical application, experience , repetitions, etc. What was natural or " just life" back then requires extra effort, time, money etc nowadays. ( Me going hiking, shooting, camping, learning Bushcraft etc )
There's very little natural incentive to evolve, outsmart etc. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 10:23:54 AM EDT
[#20]
Looking at some of the folks walking around these days, I have a hard time believing anyone could be less intelligent.
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Posted: 11/21/2023 10:24:42 AM EDT
[#21]
Quote HistoryQuoted: Nope. Lots of people have forgotten how to survive during hard times. Quote HistoryQuoted: Quoted: I believe that modern man has had generations of mental growth throughout our brief existence. Why would I listen to the ancient word of any man from millennia ago? We joke about Idiocracy being a self-fulfilling fantasy, but I believe we get smarter the longer we've been on this earth. Lots of people have forgotten how to survive during hard times. For people that pay attention, we have all of history and science as a foundation rather than having to figure out unknown phenomena from observation. The problem is that fewer people than ever are interested in that knowledge. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 10:36:57 AM EDT
[#22]
Tribalism, including intellectual, isn't all that useful.
Intelligence is complicated. Shit pros can't even decide aspects - crystallized vs fluid, triarchic makes sense, but various testing methodologies provide differing measures. Analytical, Emotional, Spatial, Memory, etc. Modern western institutions have done an excellent job of mass producing educational opportunities, and an even better job of building repositories of knowledge HII like minds can access and launch from. Language is the key - it builds the framework of internal/external models that allow associative networks. Even when you're individually discovering new elements, it's accessed by, processed through, and incorporated into the framework of all your knowledge previous - in the language(s) that organize our thoughts. Kinda like you know how a carburetor works then understand direct injection because of your ability to reference previous knowledge and understand the generalities of induction. Things get pit in place and you associate/structure all the information through language(s). Do I need to know VE % = (measured CFM potential CFM) x 100? Is anyone smarter if they do? Smarter if one can recall without referencing? Smarter if one can calculate in their head? |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 12:18:58 PM EDT
[#23]
Quote HistoryQuoted: some old dudes wrote the Constitution and I think they were quite smart. But I doubt a caveman could do it. Iroquois Confederacy and other Indigenous governments were constitutional influences. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 12:21:53 PM EDT
[#24]
Congress, both dem/rep are full of idiots. And the masses put them there. Not sure just how far we have advanced lol.
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Posted: 11/21/2023 12:22:23 PM EDT
[#25]
No our ancestors could not do the cube root of 4564435 in their heads. But most current high IQ people would die if placed naked in a cave with only a rock as a tool.
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Posted: 11/21/2023 12:24:22 PM EDT
[#26]
87% of the global human population is essentially livestock.
Consumed more than they produce, if they produce anything at all of value. And the stock is being watered down and is stupider, fatter, slower mentally and physically, incapable of fending for themselves |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 12:24:54 PM EDT
[#27]
We started going backwards when we largely removed Darwin from everyday life.
Remove warning labels, give Darwin a chance. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 12:29:21 PM EDT
[#28]
None of our ancestors (as in zero of them) had any problem visually identifying phenotypes. That's about 117,000,000,000 people who apparently had no problem deciding which bathroom (or bush) to use, or which hole to fuck.
No, I think our ancestors were quote a bit more practically intelligent than we are. They didn't have the luxury of having luxury beliefs - that would have been fatal. Street smarts were a necessity, not an option. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 12:32:36 PM EDT
[#29]
Quote HistoryQuoted: And did so with optics many of us wouldn't even want on our rifles. Galileo's first scopes were only about 3x. Gradually got to 8x and ultimately about 30x. And with those they dramatically increased our knowledge of the heavens. Quote HistoryQuoted: Quoted: Add Sumerians, Babylonians and others who studied the heavens and calculated the movement of the planets.....bunch of dumbasses if there ever were any Sadly his intelligence wasn't appreciated |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 1:36:36 PM EDT
[#30]
somehow less intelligent people figured out how to build this and moved the stones there to do it.
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Posted: 11/21/2023 1:45:05 PM EDT
[#31]
Quote HistoryQuoted: somehow less intelligent people figured out how to build this and moved the stones there to do it. https://cdn.amoils.com/health-blog/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Stonehenge-main-essentials-stock.jpg Gobekli Tepe and Boncuklu Tarla enter the chat. 
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Posted: 11/21/2023 1:50:04 PM EDT
[#32]
Ancient people were Far more intelligent than most believe they are
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Posted: 11/21/2023 1:52:17 PM EDT
[#33]
There have been many great inventions that make our life today easier than at any time in history. As for people being smarter there has always been dumb people and smart people, take Thomas Jefferson could speak 5 different languages write two at the same time one with each hand. As a whole are people becoming more intelligent, I do not think so.
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Posted: 11/21/2023 1:54:03 PM EDT
[#34]
Quote HistoryQuoted: The most intelligent human to ever live does not currently. Something happen to Hunter? |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 1:54:10 PM EDT
[#35]
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Posted: 11/21/2023 2:13:11 PM EDT
[#36]
Quote HistoryQuoted: The most intelligent human to ever live does not currently. You know all 7.888 billion people’s intelligence compared to everyone whose ever existed intelligence. Impressive…. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 2:13:11 PM EDT
[#37]
Quote HistoryQuoted: The most intelligent human to ever live does not currently. You know all 7.888 billion people’s intelligence compared to everyone whose ever existed intelligence. Impressive…. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 2:16:33 PM EDT
[#38]
Quote HistoryQuoted: Something happen to Hunter? He was killed at Iwo Jima fighting the Germans in the first world war. C'mon man. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 2:17:09 PM EDT
[#39]
Quoted: I believe that modern man has had generations of mental growth throughout our brief existence. Why would I listen to the ancient word of any man from millennia ago? We joke about Idiocracy being a self-fulfilling fantasy, but I believe we get smarter the longer we’ve been on this earth.  Attached File Attached File Attached File |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 2:19:20 PM EDT
[#40]
Read documents from the 18th and 19th century from people who typically only went to school, including college, until they were 16 or 18 years old and get back with me on that.
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Posted: 11/21/2023 2:27:44 PM EDT
[#41]
I'm not sure if we've selected for intelligence or not over the last couple millennia, probably more so in some places than others.
People were significantly more ignorant overall though, I mean sure more people knew how to skin a goat but nobody knew how disease worked, or what air is, the laws of nature or of mathematics. That's a big deal. The supposed golden age of education is a myth. Most people were barely educated at all until the 20th century. Selectivity is everything, along with demographics. That's not to detract from the accomplishments of the great minds throughout history but there was always a lot of wasted potential, or at least potential directed at other things. Craftsmanship is a disappearing trait also. The current education system is terrifying on average but somehow it still manages to produce way more qualified applicants for top programs than they have room for, with admission rates way lower than ever before at top colleges. Ideology and dogma can certainly leave people blind to reason and profoundly foolish, but that isn't anything new, that's our history. The mind virus we call "woke" seems to have produced a powerful immune response in the populace, that's not nothing. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 2:28:27 PM EDT
[#42]
Slaves were good/cheap labor as long as you could keep them under control.
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Posted: 11/21/2023 2:28:38 PM EDT
[#43]
Intelligence and wisdom may be distinguished.
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Posted: 11/21/2023 2:29:42 PM EDT
[#44]
So the constitution should be a living document then? Turn in your guns is an evolution of the mind of man?
Gonna need some clarification here, friend. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 2:30:50 PM EDT
[#45]
OP needs to define intelligence and how he intends to measure it.
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Posted: 11/21/2023 2:33:16 PM EDT
[#46]
Quote HistoryQuoted: This is the leftist take (most/all intelligence is a function of environment...also conflating education with intelligence). It's mostly bullshit. They predicted that education alone would raise average intelligence in developing countries but the effects were marginal. Teaching someone how to read better might increase their test score, but does it really mean they're more intelligent? Doubtful. Public education really became a thing around the time of the industrial revolution in order to create more efficient/obedient worker bees.  I'm not saying that there isn't a genetic component to intelligence, but it's 'tarded to argue that people, an average, were functional more intelligent than people are now. That doesn't mean that there weren't historically bright people, but the lack of educational opportunities certainly limited potential. It doesn't matter if your IQ is 125, if you still have to spend your entire life subsistence farming. IQ itself is relative. If you could timewarp someone that tested at 100 in the early 1900s to present day, and let them take an IQ test now, their modern score would fall far below 100. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 2:38:40 PM EDT
[#47]
Quoted: I believe that modern man has had generations of mental growth throughout our brief existence. Why would I listen to the ancient word of any man from millennia ago? We joke about Idiocracy being a self-fulfilling fantasy, but I believe we get smarter the longer we’ve been on this earth. Their brain capacity was as great as ours. And they used it more than today because even idiots can survive today. And if you have done a minimum of historical research you will see how smart they were |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 2:49:01 PM EDT
[#48]
Quoted: I believe that modern man has had generations of mental growth throughout our brief existence. Why would I listen to the ancient word of any man from millennia ago? We joke about Idiocracy being a self-fulfilling fantasy, but I believe we get smarter the longer we’ve been on this earth. I think the smartest tier of humans is getting smarter.....but the average intelligence is being pulled down but a bunch of uneducated idiots. |
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Posted: 11/21/2023 3:03:09 PM EDT
[#49]
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Posted: 11/21/2023 3:07:12 PM EDT
[#50]
Quoted: I believe that modern man has had generations of mental growth throughout our brief existence. Why would I listen to the ancient word of any man from millennia ago? We joke about Idiocracy being a self-fulfilling fantasy, but I believe we get smarter the longer we’ve been on this earth. Cro-Magnon man had a larger brain than current humans. And we have been de-evolving ever since. Have you looked around you lately? |
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