Re: Shrinking brains in evolution

Perplexed in Peoria <jimmenegay@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

"John Wilkins" <j.wilkins1@xxxxxxxxx> wrote...
Perplexed in Peoria <jimmenegay@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

"Anthony Campbell" <ac@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote...
Jared Diamond, in (I think) _Guns, Germs and Steel_ says that he found
the inhabitants of New Guinea to be often more intelligent than many
Westerners. He also thinks that since the invention of agriculture there
may have been a decline in intelligence over-all.

Which is a bit odd, since he also says that New Guinea is where
agriculture was invented.

No he does not. He clearly says it began in the fertile crescent (and in
Mesoamerica independently). New Guinea may have been early, but its
domestication of local species of crops occurred c7000BCE, while
southwest Asia and the fertile crescent date to around 8500BCE (acc. to
his book).

I'm uncertain if his dates are all that good, and also whether there had
been diffusion between some of the Eurasian and African sites.

Corrections accepted. Still, I dislike the hypothesis that the invention
of agriculture has led to a general decline in intelligence. While I am
more tolerant than many of the idea that there is a real characteristic
being measured by Spearman's 'g', I also believe that technologies like
agriculture or writing have transformed the selective pressures for
general intelligence rather than weakening them. A hunter-gatherer needs
to know many things and to plan and reason effectively. An
agriculturalist or pastoralist needs to know different things, and an
urban merchant or artisan needs even different skills. It happens that the
aspects of intelligence which I happen to admire the most are in the
domains of numeracy and literacy. And I really doubt that these aspects
of intelligence have declined since the advent of agriculture and
pastoralism. Still, a big part of what we call 'intelligence' lies in the
social skills needed to make effective use of the spoken word, and I doubt
that our hunter-gatherer ancestors were deficient in this regard compared
to us.

I think that intelligence is related in part to the inconstancy of the
environment. Foragers have to deal with a range of conditions, and so
intelligence is going to be selected for. Agriculture is less
inconstant. However, I really cannot think that a few thousands of years
is any real time in which to make major changes here. I suspect the
difference in intelligence (and I do not accept the biological reality
of what Spearman's "g" stands for) is based on the culture - in an
agrarian society, culture is less diverse than in a society in which
each village or clan can generate its own culture and each individual is
a substantial contributor to it.
--
John S. Wilkins, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Biohumanities Project
University of Queensland - Blog: scienceblogs.com/evolvingthoughts
"He used... sarcasm. He knew all the tricks, dramatic irony, metaphor,
bathos, puns, parody, litotes and... satire. He was vicious."

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Shrinking brains in evolution
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  • Re: Shrinking brains in evolution
    ... Westerners. ... He also thinks that since the invention of agriculture there ... since he also says that New Guinea is where agriculture ...
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  • Re: Shrinking brains in evolution
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    (sci.bio.evolution)
  • Re: NBC: Natural Selection Question
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