Cavemen

[ReverendDG]

Ok that's your opinion and thats fair, but opinions on the benefits/problems of religion aside, how can people glorify ancient people as somehow better or more advanced (in ANY way) then people today?

i really don't know to be honest.
it may have something to do with the fact that ancient people fit the beliefs or ideas that the person thinks we all should follow. after all ancient people could be what? 2000 years ago? 3000? do the jewish people and christian founders count? or do you just mean people who practice polytheism?

a lot of people i've found love to believe that being a christian long ago was better than now so we need to return to that.
as if having slavery,murder with no repercussions, disease or a life span of 30 years is better than what we have.

 

[ReverendDG]

The only bad thing in that list, IMO, is human sacrifice, and not everyone in the past took part in it. Personally, I fail to see how replacing human sacrifice with wars that kill millions, many of them innocent civilians, makes us particularly better. More advanced, but we're still killing.

true, now we just push buttons or pull a trigger.
now that i think on it, we may not be better, just different, different oppression, different slavery, different hate.

we may have just replaced things,but really haven't changed the human condition.
i think its time to quit before i just plain depress myself

 

[SkyWriting]

And there werent wars back then too? Also, slavery, abuse, murder and rape were much more commonplace and the "justice system" was barbaric.

I have a hard time imagining where your facts,figures, and statistics are coming from.

Prehistory (Latin, præ = before; Greek, ιστορία = history) is a term used to describe the period before recorded history.

Though if Adam wrote Genesis, then there was no prehistory and this would only refer to the middle, dark ages.

General impressions from museum displays you've read or seen don't really count.

 

[SkyWriting]

I thought you said ancient people were more advanced that us? What is so bad about living in a cave?

I claim, other than as temporary shelter, the "cave man" is a myth.

Most ancient tribes did not live in one area for too long. We do not actually find "landfills" until the first civilizations began to develop.

Supports the Myth theory.

I was merely stating a reasonable explanation as to why it seems there is an overabundance of stupid people.

And I was considering the source.

I know, it is the other way around. The intellect of humans has an effect on technology. I wonder why ancient people did not have cell phones, cars, or nuclear power?

Because they are the tools of stupid people, it seems.
Cell phones, and nuclear power are banned in many places.
And cars have 1000's of restrictions for their use.
Cell phones are catching up in the number of laws
against them.

The technology of a civilization tells a lot about the people.

Only if
you
can
figure
it
out.

 

[Nostromo]

In light of the last post and the fact you never answered it first time round, I'd like to repeat the question:

Then please... by what empirical milestones do you measure your assertion that ancients were brilliant, whilst moderns are morons?

 

[SkyWriting]

In light of the last post and the fact you never answered it first time round, I'd like to repeat the question:

Some choices could be:

The amount of co2 released into the atmosphere on a daily basis.
The amount of fresh water used for non drinking purposes.
The amount of unreplenishable energy used by population members on a daily basis.

These would show humanity to be at it's lowest and most moronic level ever.
These I just made up off the top of my head.
Ones involving moral behavior and social justice would take a few minutes of thought to frame properly.

 

[Psudopod]

The amount of co2 released into the atmosphere on a daily basis.
The amount of fresh water used for non drinking purposes.
The amount of unreplenishable energy used by population members on a daily basis.

What makes you think people wouldn't have done this if they had the oppertunity? These things are much higher in modern times because we have the capability to do so. What makes you think that if the technology was around then, or if people from that period were bought into ours, they'd act any differently?

Squandering of natural resorces are not new things, see for example Iceland or Easter Island.

 

[SkyWriting]

What makes you think people wouldn't have done this if they had the opportunity? These things are much higher in modern times because we have the capability to do so. What makes you think that if the technology was around then, or if people from that period were bought into ours, they'd act any differently?

Squandering of natural resources are not new things, see for example Iceland or Easter Island.

Possibly. But your "What If's" don't fit the required standards of having
Empirical Measurements.
And the years 300 to 1200 AD for the ecological disasters of Iceland and Easter Island don't represent the mythical Cave-Man we are commenting on. They would be lumped in with "Modern Man" and serve to illustrate my point well that Modern men are dunces. Female readers. I'm sure, know this already.

There are other negative modern civilization "Empirical" indicators:
Urban Sprawl in a U.S. Metropolitan Area
Way to Measure Your Body Fat
Consumption, saving and investment are core variable components in the economy


Yet, originally, when civilization was founded:

15 The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it.

Early man was of "Sharper" intellect than modern man:

19 Now out of the ground the Lord God had formed [6] every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. 20 The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field.

Though Man still made bad decisions:

"cursed is the ground because of you;
in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life;
18 thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you;
and you shall eat the plants of the field.
19 By the sweat of your face
you shall eat bread..."

 

[SkyWriting]

For anyone who wants to understand what life as a cave man was really like!

"Cave man" is a myth created to promote Darwins faulty assumption that natural selection is a mechanism capable of producing life from scratch rather than just a simple mechanism to sustain it.

 

[Nostromo]

If you want to take a Biblical approach one could argue we're just doing what God has allowed.

Genesis 1:26 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

On a more sensible note it seems that in both cases, past and present, people are just making use of that which was available to them. There's no compelling evidence that early man consciously displayed moderation in all things, as many people are learning to do today, because there simply wasn't any pressure on a relatively small pre-agrarian society to do so.

Early man overfishing?

More of the same: "demonstrating a trend of overfishing by the initial colonisers of several Pacific Islands that led to the rapid initial decimation of marine turtle populations."

The amount of co2 released into the atmosphere on a daily basis.
The amount of fresh water used for non drinking purposes.
The amount of unreplenishable energy used by population members on a daily basis.

CO2 and wasting water would be much less of a problem for a much smaller population.

Unreplenishable energy, well... what would they use fossil fuels for and how would they obtain them in any significant quantity? They used wood and animal fat because it's what they had. Do you have any reason to think these people actually put any thought into more sound ecological management than we have today?

"Cave man" is a myth created to promote Darwins faulty assumption

Show me a recent academic article that portrays all early humans as cave dwellings idiots.

 

[SkyWriting]

Show me a recent academic article that portrays all early humans as cave dwellings idiots.

Your suggesting that
the low intelligence cave man is a myth
that "Science" has lied about the intelligence of early man
and that popular science is promoted by idiots.
My point exactly.

You can't just cover up lies with "Science is self correcting".
At some point one has to admit to falsification of evidence.
Which researchers do admit.

 

[Psudopod]

Possibly. But your "What If's" don't fit the required standards of having
Empirical Measurements.

Exactly my point. What empirical evidence do you have that humans were much more intelligent thousands of years ago?

 

[Psudopod]

Your suggesting that
the low intelligence cave man is a myth
that "Science" has lied about the intelligence of early man
and that popular science is promoted by idiots.
My point exactly.

No, he's asking where you get this idea that science promotes the idea of prehistoric men being low intelligence. Technologically unadvanced is not the same as stupid.

 

[Skaloop]

Your suggesting that
the low intelligence cave man is a myth
that "Science" has lied about the intelligence of early man
and that popular science is promoted by idiots.
My point exactly.

You're not seeing the difference between knowledge and intelligence. We have more knowledge now that at any other time in human history. Little kids of today know more facts than the brightest scholars from a thousand years ago. Intelligence-wise, though, I'd guess it's been pretty much the same for quite some time.

 

[Nathan Poe]

Your suggesting that
the low intelligence cave man is a myth
that "Science" has lied about the intelligence of early man
and that popular science is promoted by idiots.
My point exactly.

You can't just cover up lies with "Science is self correcting".
At some point one has to admit to falsification of evidence.
Which researchers do admit.

When did "science" make the claims you think you're refuting?

 

[Nostromo]

Your suggesting that the low intelligence cave man is a myth

No, I'm asking you for evidence to support your claim.

 

[SkyWriting]

[/i][/i]

Exactly my point. What empirical evidence do you have that humans were much more intelligent thousands of years ago?

One option is one can take current data trends and extrapolate back.
Or you can take written historical records and compare to modern abilities. What a difference even 200 years makes:
Founding Fathers Feb 8, 2010 ... One was a shoemaker, surveyor, lawyer, jurist, lay theologian, and statesman.

Founders of modern science
COMPARATIVE ANATOMY GEORGES CUVIER (1769-1832)
COMPUTER SCIENCE CHARLES BABBAGE (1792-1871)
DIMENSIONAL ANALYSIS LORD RAYLEIGH (1842-1919)
DYNAMICS ISAAC NEWTON (1642-1727)
ELECTRONICS JOHN AMBROSE FLEMING (1849-1945)
ELECTRODYNAMICS JAMES CLERK MAXWELL (1831-1879)
ELECTRO-MAGNETICS MICHAEL FARADAY (1791-1867)
ENERGETICS LORD KELVIN (1824-1907)
ENTOMOLOGY OF LIVING INSECTS HENRI FABRE (1823-1915)
FIELD THEORY MICHAEL FARADAY (1791-1867)
FLUID MECHANICS GEORGE STOKES (1819-1903)
GALACTIC ASTRONOMY WILLIAM HERSCHEL (1738-1822)
GAS DYNAMICS ROBERT BOYLE (1627-1691)
GENETICS GREGOR MENDEL (1822-1884)
GLACIAL GEOLOGY LOUIS AGASSIZ (1807-1873)
GYNECOLOGY JAMES SIMPSON (1811-1870)
HYDRAULICS LEONARDO DA VINCI (1452-1519)
HYDROGRAPHY MATTHEW MAURY (1806-1873)

 

[Skaloop]

One option is one can take current data trends and extrapolate back.

OK! Let's do that!

How about literacy? If you extrapolate data about literacy rates back a couple of hundred years, what would be your conclusion?

 

[plindboe]

One option is one can take current data trends and extrapolate back.
Or you can take written historical records and compare to modern abilities. What a difference even 200 years makes:

Illiteracy was very prevalent just a few centuries ago, and go just a little further back and almost no one could write. The few people who could write were highly educated intellectuals.

Also, keep in mind, that the writings from the past that survived to this day were the ones that are the most interesting and worth saving.

Both these factors will bias the results heavily, if you compare the quality of the average writings of today with the average writings of the past.

Peter

 

[SkyWriting]

OK! Let's do that!

How about literacy? If you extrapolate data about literacy rates back a couple of hundred years, what would be your conclusion?

Very tough to answer.

"What constitutes literacy has changed throughout history. It has only recently become expected and desirable to be fully literate and demeaning if you are not. At one time, a literate person was one who could sign his or her name. At other points, literacy was measured by the ability to read the Bible." Read more: literacy - World literacy rates, Literacy and the Industrial Revolution, Teaching literacy literacy - World literacy rates, Literacy and the Industrial Revolution, Teaching literacy


But the last 80 had a clear trend of illiteracy falling:


Mostly tied to the Bible:

"Examples of highly literate cultures in the past

The large amount of graffiti found at Roman sites such as Pompeii, shows that at least a large minority of the population would have been literate.
Because of its emphasis on the individual reading of the Qur'an in the original Arabic alphabet many Islamic countries have known a comparatively high level of literacy during most of the past twelve centuries. In Islamic edict (or Fatwa), to be literate is an individual religious obligation.

In the Middle Ages, literacy rates among Jews in Europe were much higher than in the surrounding Christian populations.
In New England, the literacy rate was over 50 percent during the first half of the 17th century, and it rose to 70 percent by 1710.
In Wales, the literacy rate rocketed during the 18th century, when Griffith Jones ran a system of circulating schools, with the aim of enabling everyone to read the Bible (in Welsh). It is claimed that, in 1750, Wales had the highest literacy rate of any country in the world."

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