Subject:
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Re: Future of Humanity (was: lotsa stuff)
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Mon, 29 Oct 2001 23:36:51 GMT
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Viewed:
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914 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Dave Schuler writes:
> >
> > > > This is an interesting point. It is a generaisation, but in the UK low
> > > > income families tend to have more kids than higher earners. Many couples
> > > > (married or otherwsie) decide to have only one or no kids at all. If we
> > > > assume (again a generisation) that low income familes have lower levels of
> > > > intelligence (measured by lower levels of educational attainment) is our
> > > > gene pool geing skewed the wrong way?
> > >
> > > Is there a "wrong way"?
> >
> > I would think that most people with at least middling intelligence would tend
> > to agree that decreasing the overall intelligence level of our species is
> > the "wrong way".
> >
> > Do you have a reason to think that decreasing our species intelligence is the
> > right way to go?
>
> Though admittedly a generalization, this trend in intelligence:breeding
> rate is based on an evolutionarily insignificant stretch of time. Further,
> even in the hypothetical example, the judging of intelligence based on
> academic achievement seems a tenuous yardstick at best and may have little
> or nothing to do with "actual" intelligence.
A couple of eminently debatable assertions.
*Read Gould's "Mismeasure of Man" for a perspective on the furphy of IQ
testing -- recent editions include a refutation of the premise and
methodology that inform "The Bell Curve" c/ race /class. Also consider the
human tendency to intermarry, historical success of meritocracy vs caste
systems...
*Cultural evolution has almost certainly overtaken biological evolution as
the most important aspect of species wide change in humans. It's not what
you've got but how you use it: even if we are becoming "more stupid" or
"lazier" it's because (and doesn't matter as much because) we have a broader
palette of intellectual tools available. So there's no need for everyone to
memorise slabs of text when it's all searchable online instantly, and no
need for everyone to know the ancient classics when there are now so many
more worthy fields (like cinema, football commentary, server administration
or biotechnology) where you can be accepted as an expert.
> I also know that you're making a rhetorical generalization, but there's
> obviously no way to know what effect a few (or even a few dozen) generations
> in a small population will have on the overall course of human genetics.
> It's an interesting example, however; in one swoop it evokes both Wells and
> Marx, not to mention Huxley and all the rest.
> But to answer your question, it seems a better evolutionary strategy in
> the long run to increase, rather than decrease, species intelligence.
It depends on how you define "evolutionary strategy", not to mention
"species intelligence" (cf the discussion on "animal morality" -- can
different species intelligences be meaningfully compared?). To take the
second first, in social species are you referring to individual or
collective intelligence? One ant vs a whole colony = one neuron vs a brain
(=one AFOL vs LUGNET?!?). The most widely cited example is the Aunt Hillary
character in Hofstadter's "Godel, Escher, Bach", though distributed
processing and the "superorganism" literature are analogous. More links:
http://slashdot.org/articles/01/09/14/1238226.shtml
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Forum/7387/AntIntelligence.htm
In terms of evolutionary strategy, have a look at:
http://www.xerces.org/why_conserve_inverts.htm
(note the success of ants and termites too). How do we define success?
Biomass? Ecological impact , or ecological necessity? Attainment of
consciousness? Diversity of inhabited niches? Time between a species
appearing and going extinct? It seems to me that increasing human
intelligence has certainly threatened the last of these.
> But who knows? Maybe somewhere down the line there'll be a virus that only
> attacks people of a certain level of intelligence. I picture an amusement
> park sign: You Must Be At Least As Dumb As This Sign To Survive The Plague...
truth, fiction and all that...
http://www.testpublishers.org/newsletter5.htm
--DaveL
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | Re: Future of Humanity (was: lotsa stuff)
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| (...) Though admittedly a generalization, this trend in intelligence:breeding rate is based on an evolutionarily insignificant stretch of time. Further, even in the hypothetical example, the judging of intelligence based on academic achievement (...) (23 years ago, 29-Oct-01, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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