3 ms·

Why ? I've heard that things might have changed 80k years ago when thanks to cultural progress autism went from negative to positive (for the community), but ot

Why ? I've heard that things might have changed 80k years ago when thanks to cultural progress autism went from negative to positive (for the community), but otherwise AFAIK there haven't been any significant changes since the apparition of homo sapiens 350k-400k years ago ?

antibuddy 6y ago
Autism is by (original) definition a disorder. If everyone has that disorder, then it is no longer a disorder. I think many people confuse specializaiton, focus and/or intellect with autism.
- BlueTemplar 6y ago
  I feel that is just one of the definitions of autism ? Anyway, I didn't want to suggest that everyone had to have it : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25484160 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25484160
pacman2 6y ago
There is an argument that the mind of people changed a few thousand years ago, part as a cultural phenomenon, part as a genetic selection process. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Origin_of_Consciousness_in_the_Breakdown_of_the_Bicameral_Mind https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Origin_of_Consciousness_in... (the genetic selection process is mentioned in the book, the wiki abstract puts more focus on a cultural development)
- Hikikomori 6y ago
  One of my favourite cyberpunk novels was inspired by this, Snow Crash.
- BlueTemplar 6y ago
  That's a fascinating theory, but also quite a wild claim which seems to be hard to falsify ? (And the link with the matter at hand is even more tenuous, since it's only partially genetic.) It's a bit like if you were saying that you couldn't teach a prehistoric child to read (but even more exaggerated) ?
  - antibuddy 6y ago
    Everything so far ago is at least hard to prove/falsify, however this is true either way. I think every possible scenario (prehistorics being of more, less or equal potential) is at least plausible. At least it's easy to come up with arguments for each of these cases (and a hidden one being of different brain specialization).
    - dogma1138 6y ago
      Not really since we do have DNA sequencing of prehistoric humans. Whilst we don’t understand the correlation between genetics and intelligence on a sufficient level there aren’t that many genetic differences in fact you can’t necessarily distinguish the age of the sample that easily either unless you are looking at very specific groups. And as far as modern hunter gatherers go we know that they aren’t less intelligent than urban humans.
      - pacman2 6y ago
        People have also claimed, hunters may have been smarter on average. BTW, DNA sequencing does not tell you much. You would need an extremely big sample for comparisons, and even this would exclude methylation patterns and other things.
        dogma1138 6y ago
        People claim a lot of things, it doesn’t mean they are of substance. We have sufficient evidence of advanced tool making and culture spanning back far enough through human history to indicate that intelligence isn't a modern fluke, heck copper mining and smelting dates back to at least 9000 BCE, the pyramids in Giza date back to 2600 BCE which means that we are closer to Caesar to today than Caesar was to the pyramids. While I’m open to discussion that over 350-400K years some evolutionary steps happened as far as our intelligence goes. But I am more than comfortable with stating that plucking a human from 10K BCE and exposing them to modern education would yield an average human today.
- tsimionescu 6y ago
  The bicameral mind is an interesting story, but it is not taken as a serious possibility in any branch of science that studies the human mind, as far as I know.

antibuddy 6y ago

Autism is by (original) definition a disorder. If everyone has that disorder, then it is no longer a disorder. I think many people confuse specializaiton, focus and/or intellect with autism.

BlueTemplar 6y ago
I feel that is just one of the definitions of autism ? Anyway, I didn't want to suggest that everyone had to have it : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25484160 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25484160

pacman2 6y ago

There is an argument that the mind of people changed a few thousand years ago, part as a cultural phenomenon, part as a genetic selection process. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Origin_of_Consciousness_in_the_Breakdown_of_the_Bicameral_Mind https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Origin_of_Consciousness_in... (the genetic selection process is mentioned in the book, the wiki abstract puts more focus on a cultural development)

Hikikomori 6y ago
One of my favourite cyberpunk novels was inspired by this, Snow Crash.
BlueTemplar 6y ago
That's a fascinating theory, but also quite a wild claim which seems to be hard to falsify ? (And the link with the matter at hand is even more tenuous, since it's only partially genetic.) It's a bit like if you were saying that you couldn't teach a prehistoric child to read (but even more exaggerated) ?
- antibuddy 6y ago
  Everything so far ago is at least hard to prove/falsify, however this is true either way. I think every possible scenario (prehistorics being of more, less or equal potential) is at least plausible. At least it's easy to come up with arguments for each of these cases (and a hidden one being of different brain specialization).
  - dogma1138 6y ago
    Not really since we do have DNA sequencing of prehistoric humans. Whilst we don’t understand the correlation between genetics and intelligence on a sufficient level there aren’t that many genetic differences in fact you can’t necessarily distinguish the age of the sample that easily either unless you are looking at very specific groups. And as far as modern hunter gatherers go we know that they aren’t less intelligent than urban humans.
    - pacman2 6y ago
      People have also claimed, hunters may have been smarter on average. BTW, DNA sequencing does not tell you much. You would need an extremely big sample for comparisons, and even this would exclude methylation patterns and other things.
      - dogma1138 6y ago
        People claim a lot of things, it doesn’t mean they are of substance. We have sufficient evidence of advanced tool making and culture spanning back far enough through human history to indicate that intelligence isn't a modern fluke, heck copper mining and smelting dates back to at least 9000 BCE, the pyramids in Giza date back to 2600 BCE which means that we are closer to Caesar to today than Caesar was to the pyramids. While I’m open to discussion that over 350-400K years some evolutionary steps happened as far as our intelligence goes. But I am more than comfortable with stating that plucking a human from 10K BCE and exposing them to modern education would yield an average human today.
tsimionescu 6y ago
The bicameral mind is an interesting story, but it is not taken as a serious possibility in any branch of science that studies the human mind, as far as I know.