How large a leap in cognitive ability do you think occurred between our last common ancestor with the great apes, and us? (p1) Was it mostly a change in personal intelligence, or could human success be explained by our greater ability to accumulate knowledge from others in society? How can we tell how much smarter, in the relevant sense, a chimp is than a human? This chapter claims Koko the Gorilla has a tested IQ of about 80 (see table 2).
What can we infer from answers to these questions?
I would bet heavily on the accumulation. National average IQ has been going up by about 3 points per decade for quite a few decades, so there have definitely been times when Koko’s score might have been above average. Now, I’m more inclined to say that this doesn’t mean great things for the IQ test overall, but I put enough trust in it to say that it’s not differences in intelligence that prevented the gorillas from reaching the prominence of humans. It might have slowed them down, but given this data it shouldn’t have kept them pre-Stone-Age.
Given that the most unique aspect of humans relative to other species seems to be the use of language to pass down knowledge, I don’t know what else it really could be. What other major things do we have going for us that other animals don’t?
Sure, I still don’t think that if you elevated the intelligence of a group of chimps to the top 5% of humanity without adding some better form of communication and idea accumulation it wouldn’t matter.
If Newton were born in ancient Egypt, he might have made some serious progress, but he almost certainly wouldn’t have discovered calculus and classical mechanics. Being able to stand on the shoulders of giants is really important.
It is possible, then, that exposure to complex visual media has produced genuine increases in a significant form of intelligence. This hypothetical form of intelligence might be called “visual analysis.” Tests such as Raven’s may show the largest Flynn gains because they measure visual analysis rather directly; tests of learned content may show the smallest gains because they do not measure visual analysis at all.
Eh, not especially. IIRC, scores have also had to be renormalized on Stanford-Binet and Weschler tests over the years. That said, I’d bet it has some effect, but I’d be much more willing to bet on less malnutrition, less beating / early head injury, and better public health allowing better development during childhood and adolescence.
That said, I’m very interested in any data that points to other causes behind the Flynn Effect, so if you have any to post don’t hesitate.
It just means that the intelligence gap was smaller, potentially much, much smaller, when humans first started developing a serious edge relative to apes. It’s not evidence for accumulation per se, but it’s evidence against us just being so much smarter from the get go, and renormalizing has it function very much like evidence for accumulation.
I think it was the ability to work together thanks to omega-3s from eating fish among other things. Our ability to create a course of action and execute as a group started us on the path to the present day.
How large a leap in cognitive ability do you think occurred between our last common ancestor with the great apes, and us? (p1) Was it mostly a change in personal intelligence, or could human success be explained by our greater ability to accumulate knowledge from others in society? How can we tell how much smarter, in the relevant sense, a chimp is than a human? This chapter claims Koko the Gorilla has a tested IQ of about 80 (see table 2).
What can we infer from answers to these questions?
I would bet heavily on the accumulation. National average IQ has been going up by about 3 points per decade for quite a few decades, so there have definitely been times when Koko’s score might have been above average. Now, I’m more inclined to say that this doesn’t mean great things for the IQ test overall, but I put enough trust in it to say that it’s not differences in intelligence that prevented the gorillas from reaching the prominence of humans. It might have slowed them down, but given this data it shouldn’t have kept them pre-Stone-Age.
Given that the most unique aspect of humans relative to other species seems to be the use of language to pass down knowledge, I don’t know what else it really could be. What other major things do we have going for us that other animals don’t?
I think what controls the rate of change is the intelligence of the top 5%, not the average intelligence.
Sure, I still don’t think that if you elevated the intelligence of a group of chimps to the top 5% of humanity without adding some better form of communication and idea accumulation it wouldn’t matter.
If Newton were born in ancient Egypt, he might have made some serious progress, but he almost certainly wouldn’t have discovered calculus and classical mechanics. Being able to stand on the shoulders of giants is really important.
I think that language plus our acquisition of the ability to make quasi-permanent records of human utterances are the biggest differentiators.
Do you think this is a sensible view?
Eh, not especially. IIRC, scores have also had to be renormalized on Stanford-Binet and Weschler tests over the years. That said, I’d bet it has some effect, but I’d be much more willing to bet on less malnutrition, less beating / early head injury, and better public health allowing better development during childhood and adolescence.
That said, I’m very interested in any data that points to other causes behind the Flynn Effect, so if you have any to post don’t hesitate.
I’m just trying to make sure I understand—I remember being confused about the Flynn effect and about what Katja asked above.
How does the Flynn effect affect our belief in the hypothesis of accumulation?
It just means that the intelligence gap was smaller, potentially much, much smaller, when humans first started developing a serious edge relative to apes. It’s not evidence for accumulation per se, but it’s evidence against us just being so much smarter from the get go, and renormalizing has it function very much like evidence for accumulation.
I think it was the ability to work together thanks to omega-3s from eating fish among other things. Our ability to create a course of action and execute as a group started us on the path to the present day.