Comments: There’s also something called The Sapien Paradox, which means, why did humans become smart so late?
The written language and something to write it on that would last through multiple generations. Simple as that. Then man no longer had to resolve all the many smaller problems that led up too the bigger ones. He could build on the work of others. Tribes and tribal oral historians kinda filled in somewhat before the written language too.
Posted by GoneWithTheWind at March 22, 2017 10:36 AM
In the beginning was the Word.
Posted by pbird at March 22, 2017 10:51 AM
Group thinking always takes longer than individual thinking (lowest common denominator and all that). So, in any given group most will lag but a few will excel in spite of the enormous pull-back.
Posted by ghostsniper at March 22, 2017 11:18 AM
Because civilization was required for large-scale brewing and fermentation, and that required inventing all kinds of new things - simple machines, accurate measuring, ways to keep records and organizing armies to protect foodstuffs and trade routes.
I am not making this up.
Posted by Donald Sensing at March 22, 2017 1:25 PM
I wonder about this too: we live in a War Universe (says Wm. Burroughs). Or maybe more accurately, it's a very competitive universe. Competition makes everything go (which is why the Left's "Everyone gets a prize!" nonsense is anti-ethical).
Next: it's been shown that people have more or less the same general intelligence the world over. It's not like one country has Sapiens, and another has orangutans. We're all pretty well matched in intelligence.
So if intelligence evolves via competition, and two well-matched armies fight, let's supppose one is victorious.
The soldiers and generals were equal in intelligence, and as typically happens, luck plays a big part in the outcome. Either side might have won.
So how does one commander increase general human intelligence by spreading his genetic seed, and not the other (the possibly dead one)? Or maybe they both do. I don't know.
I accept the obvious fact that competition makes things go, from the valence of atoms, to sports teams, to every other kind of conflict. I just don't see how intelligence could evolve so fast as a result.
Maybe cosmic rays provide necessary mutations? Or what? I'm confused as usual.
But not as confused as when I look in a mirror, and see my right and left hands reversed. But my head and feet aren't...
...Help! My confusion is ratcheting up!
Posted by Smokey at March 22, 2017 2:49 PM
It would seem that the ratio of humans to wildly growing vegetative edibles and protein rich animals was a factor in the rate of organized agricultural food supply, fishing, and domestication of animals for food.
When populations outran their wild food supply they either went to war or migrated to wild food rich environments or obtained food via war on those with greater food supplies.
Cardboard and iron cans were the stomach-turning points in civilization. As we learned to use cardboard as added roughage in oatmeal and other grains, we developed exponentially and excrementally.
Iron cans, used initially for banana peel storage, were found, ironically, to be more useful as rust after they'd corroded. Rusting, decomposing cans demanded a better container -- voila! the invention of TV dinners and TV dinner diners! The former were encased in colorful cardboard and the latter, due to premature demise from malnutrition, were encased in cardboard coffins, permitting easier access to the protein rich cadavers by worms and politicians.
Tomorrow we will discuss the place of living plastic and electronics -- exoskeletons, pace makers, prosthetic limbs, ethics and morals implants,... , and banana peels as lubricants for lunacy, making it easier for all to smoothly run or walk amok.
Posted by Howard Nelson at March 22, 2017 4:38 PM
Sometimes I wonder what HN's hobbies are.
Posted by ghostsniper at March 23, 2017 8:21 AM
Say again!
Posted by GoneWithTheWind at March 23, 2017 9:07 AM
"Why Facts Don't Change Our Minds"
"The vaunted human capacity for reason may have more to do with winning arguments than with thinking straight."
Which explains Facebook. Very interesting article, made more interesting by the fact that the author can't stop herself from inserting her personal political biases all while denouncing inserting personal biases into reasoning.
Posted by Donald Sensing at March 24, 2017 8:42 AM