Tom Bri wrote:
> Another argument is that repeated starvation selects for brains that use
> energy more efficiently, or simply use less energy. This tends to 
> select for
> lower intelligence, and the neolithic brought with it severe and 
> prolonged
> periods of starvation, and also generations-long malnutrition.
>
> So we may be at the losing end of a few thousand years of selection for
> lowered intelligence! Paleolithic peoples had larger brains on average 
> than
> we moderns do.
>
> One area we seem to have severely backslidden is in art. The tiny
> populations of ice age Europe produced art at a level of skill and 
> artistry
> that only a very few moderns can compete with, with all our billions of
> population. And we can only see the art they left on cave walls or the 
> few
> surviving statues. I sometimes wonder what art they produced on 
> perishable
> materials that we will never know about.
>
> On the other hand, I have never seen any evidence, besides Jarred 
> Diamond's
> claims, that modern hunter-gatherers are any great shakes in the brains
> department.
>
>

It's all just pure speculation given the state of the art of Paleo 
anthropology. However, I maintain that the fundamental premise of Paleo 
is that humanity has not evolved to a point where we have been able to 
adapt to the radical change in diet that happened in the Neolithic. If 
we all agree that our digestive systems haven't evolved very much (Which 
is the point of this list) then we ought to agree that the rest of our 
bodies haven't evolved much either. Therefore, it seems reasonable that 
we are about as smart as those who came before us. We can't prove it 
either way.

As for your contention that ice age art is superior to modern art, I 
would offer that the only ice age art that has survived is either cave 
drawings or sculpture. What constitutes modern art is so much broader. 
To the best of our knowledge, ice age man didn't have writing. If there 
is any technology that has fundamentally changed the way we think and 
operate it is what you are looking at right now. Modern science, art, 
religion, philosophy, etc. are all based on the written word. Paleo man 
didn't have that as far as we know. What he understood and was exposed 
to was necessarily limited to his immediate surroundings. So, I would 
argue that while he was no less smart than modern man the structure of 
his thought and belief was far more localized.

There are two fallacies. The first is that the new ways are better than 
the old. The second is that the old ways are better than the new. The 
lesson of Paleo is that fundamentally, biologically, there is no 
difference. So, fundamentally, biologically, we are no better or worse. 
There is value in understanding where we came from. There is also value 
in participating in where we are and where we are going. We must take 
the lessons of the past - both the distant and the recent - and carry 
them into the future.