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Researchers suggest Victorian-era people more intelligent than modern-day counterparts
PhyOrg ^ | 17 May 2013 | Bob Yirka

Posted on 05/18/2013 5:32:16 PM PDT by rjbemsha

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To: E. Pluribus Unum
> There was a lot more natural selection going on then.

I second that. It seems to us now that their average intelligence was higher only because the stupid, lazy, and violent ones died young.

41 posted on 05/18/2013 7:16:18 PM PDT by Flatus I. Maximus (Fight Third-World Despotism. Overthrow Obama.)
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To: rjbemsha

Who was in the original sample?


42 posted on 05/18/2013 7:30:25 PM PDT by huldah1776
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To: BobL

Russia did not make quick work of either Napoleon or the Germans. The Russian winter made quick work of both of them.


43 posted on 05/18/2013 7:32:28 PM PDT by BBell (And Now for Something Completely Different)
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To: Flatus I. Maximus

I think you have to be very careful with this line of reasoning, I don’t mean because of political censure, but because the causes and effects are very subtle. Most of the selection for intelligence in recent times has been sexual selection, and resulted in a a social elite, or probably a number of distinct social elites. Even within my own memory, it was the convention for members of such elite groups to discourage breeding with outsiders. Notwithstanding that the encouragement of these tendencies has fallen out of favor, the tendencies themselves persist.


44 posted on 05/18/2013 7:35:09 PM PDT by dr_lew
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To: rjbemsha
Been around the world and found That only stupid people are breeding

The cretins cloning and feeding

And I don't even own a tv

45 posted on 05/18/2013 7:35:16 PM PDT by BBell (And Now for Something Completely Different)
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To: rjbemsha
smarter people having fewer children, while the less smart, have more

I could of told them that. I live just north of New Orleans.

46 posted on 05/18/2013 7:37:04 PM PDT by BBell (And Now for Something Completely Different)
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To: rjbemsha
They back up their claim by suggesting they know the reason for the decline in intelligence—smarter people having fewer children, while the less smart, have more.


47 posted on 05/18/2013 7:39:59 PM PDT by dfwgator
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To: yarddog

Attic civilization fluorished for about 350 years. The Mayflower Compact is dated 1620. Do the math.
The first ancient and modern experiments with the proposition that ‘men and women are capable ot governing themselves.
(The Greek playwright, name escapes me sorry, even referenced Athens in his play ‘Clouds’ as “the home of the brave.”)
Cause of the fail? The Greeks themselves would probably blame ‘hybris.’
(Autocorrect thinks it was ‘hybrids.’)

Corialanus, what do you think? Yeah, that’s what I think, too:
‘Democrats.’
Oh yeah, Aristophenes. A conservative btw.


48 posted on 05/18/2013 8:27:27 PM PDT by tumblindice (America's founding fathers: All armed conservatives.)
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To: rjbemsha
"They base their controversial assertion on..."

How is it controversial? It is common sense to anyone who has encountered a public school in recent years.

49 posted on 05/18/2013 10:01:55 PM PDT by UnwashedPeasant
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To: Farmer Dean
There weren’t a lot of drugs to abuse back then,unlike today.

Actually it was quite the opposite. There were indeed drugs and the were legal. The number of drug addicts to population numbers was no higher, in fact probably lower, than today. The reason being that people could see the deteriorating effects drugs had on people and stayed away from them, they didn't need the government telling them what was good or bad for them, they had parents for that job. In fact coca-cola derived its name from the use of cocaine in the original recipe. When they said coke gave you a lift, they meant it!Once drugs were outlawed they had to change the recipe.

50 posted on 05/19/2013 7:21:04 PM PDT by calex59
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