How smart was ancient man? (28 min video)

Creation.com ^ | 3-03 (but highlighted 1-16-2014) | n/a

[afsnco]

We stand on the shoulders of giants. The closer in time we get to creation, the greater the intelligence, the less genetic mutation and drift.

People were smart enough to invent things like the wheel, etc. Today we think they’re no-brainers, but at one point it took a brain to come up with those things. And they didn’t have the benefit of a few thousand years of accumulated human knowledge.

[Peter ODonnell]

We could watch the David Letterman show and find out.

[CardCarryingMember.VastRightWC]

A proof that crap floats to the top of the talent pool in party politics.

In other words, these politicians are the Cream of the Crap

:-)

[CardCarryingMember.VastRightWC]

We stand on the shoulders of giants.

Obama also stands on the shoulders of giants, ie the last two Dem Prezzes preceding him. He's The Best of The Best, in that he combines the Morality & Integrity & Authenticity of Bill Clinton with the Effectiveness, Leadership and Matchless Accomplishments (especially in Foreign Policy) of Jimmy "The Peanut" Carter.

Or at least in the Dem's hagiography.

But from where I am, he appears to be Standing on the Shoulders of Midgets. (Apologies for defaming Little People)

[fishtank]

hahahaha!!!!

AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Disambiguator]

Just read what was written in the past. Our founding fathers wrote a lot, and much of it is difficult to interpret for modern readers. A good example is the Federalist Papers.

Then, go read the Bible. The apostle Paul wrote his epistles and freely quoted the Old Testament, likely from memory (especially while he was in prison).

Just because their technology wasn’t advanced like it is now, doesn’t mean they were stupid. In some ways I think modern devices detract from our intellect simply be being such a distraction. We don’t take the time to really ponder things like we should.

[RobbyS]

A huge, well constructed temple complex has been unearthed in southern Turkey, as finely done as Egyptian stonework done thousands of years later. Who can know tell what might be unearthed after archaeologists have worked for another hundred years? Two hundred years ago, the learned were saying that Homer had no basis in fact. Now we know that The world of the Odyssey and the Iliad existed much as he described it, and who knows but that its leading characters were not real or at least based on real folks? We know so little but think we know it all. In the scale of time, our scientists are 18-year olds.

[dubyagee]

I could well be mistaken but I think if you look at the genealogy of some of greatest inventors and thinkers (DaVinci, Galileo, etc.) you’ll find that your theory falls flat on its face.

[TexasFreeper2009]

Either intelligence is inheritable or it is not.

If it is (as it must be) then breeding between two intelligent adults will on average produce more intelligent children than breeding between two dumb people, or between one intelligent and one dumb person.

Long before humans even knew of DNA or gene's we intuitively knew this and thus was born the concept of the aristrocry and why they only married each other or those who had newly earned their way into what was basically an elite breeding club.

[PeterPrinciple]

Long before humans even knew of DNA or gene’s we intuitively knew this and thus was born the concept of the aristrocry and why they only married each other

---

And we got it wrong, In breeding is a useful tool but hybrid vigor is a better tool.

[PeterPrinciple]

Just because their technology wasn’t advanced like it is now, doesn’t mean they were stupid. In some ways I think modern devices detract from our intellect simply be being such a distraction. We don’t take the time to really ponder things like we should.

---

Intellect is a hard term to define though it easily rolls off our tongue.

You are right in that no one ponders any more, we let others do our thinking for us..................

[PeterPrinciple]

records that people began with high intelligence and had great capabilities.

---

I have a theory, can’t prove it but it would seem to me that we are devolving, meaning losing some of the amazing genetic information that we once had. But I have had some friends propose that backups exist in all that “junk DNA” and somehow the backups get used when needed.

Also wasn’t there just a discovery that there are multiple information patterns in DNA and we have only seen one?

[Verginius Rufus]

I think it was Lord Bryce who observed that American politicians tended to be mediocrities--the best men did not go into politics. He wrote a famous book about American government in 1888. He was later the British ambassador to the US.

If you except the Founding Fathers and an occasional individual after that period, there is a lot to be said for that assessment.

[dubyagee]

Yes, that’s worked so well for the British Monarchy. I’m sure intellectual ability in part lies in the genes...personality and societal upbringing likely play a large part, as well. I don’t think it’s something you can simplify — idiot savants are quite the quandary.

[TexasFreeper2009]

Only marrying other members of the elite class is not the same as “in breeding”

Ashkenazi Jews have been breeding exclusively with each other for 1,000’s of years and are proven to be far more intelligent.

It is a mistake to think that humans can not be bred like any other animal breed for certain desired traits.

[TexasFreeper2009]

America was primarily founded by the lesser sons of the European aristocracy (this was especially true in the South)

[Verginius Rufus]

It may be true that only the younger sons of aristocratic families would have gone to the New World (if they had no hope of an inheritance back home) but they must have been an insignificant proportion of the emigrants. Most people in England, Scotland, or Ireland were not aristocrats, and it was that sort of people who would willingly go to America. Of course some went unwillingly as punishment for crimes.

[namvolunteer]

I think that’sh what Shimmy The Greek wash trying to say! Hic! Hic!

[AllAmericanGirl44]

bkmk