June 13th, 2009, 06:37 AM
I was wondering if someone could tell me if their are any known or suspected differences between man of today and man of say 50,000 and 25,000 years ago in terms of their physical and mental attributes? Specifically with respects to intelligence and agression.
Any information would be appreciated.
Yes. 25.000 ago the average IQ of a human was non-existent.
That's because the IQ test wasn't invented yet.
Shoo fly, dont bother me.
vot?
En Anglais alstublieft.
what is a shoe fly ?
I think we have a topic on this topic don't we? I am too lazy to look it up.
I know that I have typed up the answer a million times already on the internet.
(that is the topic of the OP).
someone look it up.
Are you talking about the difference between us and earlier Homo Sapiens, or are you taking about Neanderthals, which persisted to about 30,000 years ago?
I had an anthropology prof who said that Homo Sapiens developed our "cute overbite" only in the middle ages; apparently our teeth occluded more or less perfectly before then. I never pursued this factoid to see if it were actually true...
Aggression would be difficult to assess. Humans have evolved as social animals and aggression can manifest itself in the individual or as a group.
Even the happy-go-lucky dog can partake in aggression when put in a group of three or more dogs. Put three adolescent human males together and aggressive behavior can escalate to a level greater than any of the three as individuals would normally partake in.
Aggression at the individual level is largely a product of specific hormones and the quantity of those hormones and when they are released. I don't know how that could be known or measured thousands of years after the fact.
No, we are not 'the same' as humans 25,000 years ago but the differences might not be all that great and perhaps within the continuum of differences between some individuals today.
I heard a presentation last year on 14th international symposium on dental morphology where they claimed that perfect occlusion is a myth in the sense that originally the occlusion was constantly changing and adapting due to wear. Teeth would be worn down to such a degree that occlusion was also reached and it was dynamic.Originally Posted by C_Sensei
It ended when the teeth were worn down completely.
This wear leads to a so-called edge to edge bite, which is considered abnormal in modern dentistry
Makes perfect sense.
This prof also showed us some pictures of having put a jean jacket, sunglasses and baseball cap on a metal life-sized statue of a Neanderthal. It was to illustrate the point that you couldn't tell the difference at first; you would consider it a rough and tough modern human.
Behaviors would be entirely another matter of course; but then again, there are 'stone-age' H Sapiens tribes existing today that behave entirely differently from our culture.
Given our modern age of medical technology, a lot more weaklings get to live that would have otherwise been weeded out to a much greater extent in the past. While Sparta was an extreme example of enforced Eugenics, we can be pretty sure that many birth deformities that live perfectly productive lives today would have been left on a pedestal for the wolves in the far past.
Carl Sagan mentioned that at a dinner party he asked how many people would be alive at that moment had it not been for modern medical technology. Very few hands went up.
How many of us sitting at our computer can claim to have the same amount of dense muscle our ancestors would have gained from a daily life of tracking, hunting, and fighting wars to protect your resources?
I am extremely interested in the related question: how would my black belt skills rate against a stone age male that wanted to kill me?
Maybe I am lucky enough that I can get my answer by picking a fight in the deep amazon?
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