In general, were the people from 2,000 or more years ago less intelligent then humans now?

Question

In general, were the people from 2,000 or more years ago less intelligent then humans now?

Answer 1

Equally intelligent the technology was just different.

Answer 2

I don't think so because they were knowledgeable by their own right since they were able to survive and evolve and progress into cultured beings to be able to create such infrastructures like the pyramids, great wall etc. They concentrated on the things that where at their time important- which is survival. In our time, we to do the same thing, we try to survive since the demand of life is different from then and now.

Answer 3

Intelligence is a capacity. So, no!

We often confuse our inventory of accumulated information with intelligence.

Did you forget the genius of Democritus, the "laughing philosopher", 460 - 370 BCE? He said that we should forget the 'earth wind fire and water' rumor.

"It is all the, atomos". He discovered the atom 2000 years before anybody could see it.

I'd call that kind-a smart!   You?

I'll tell Ya what we do have in abundance:

Ego!

Answer 4

As regards IQ, yes. Over the past hundred years IQ score have gone up about 30 points in the developed world, the test have to be continually adjust to normalise the score. It's called the Flynn effect.

The sudden technology explosion in the past few decades would suggest we are getting smarter too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flynn_effec...

As to whether IQ is an accurate measure of intelligence, a very big study correlated IQ to life outcome. So the smarter you are the more (on average) you earn. The higher the IQ the less likely you are to end up in prison and divorced. So IQ seems to be a good indicator of your intelligence. It's also a better predictor of job performance than any other single factor, which is why the army IQ tests its recruits. The higher the IQ, the less likely a soldier is to have shoot himself in the foot.

Answer 5

I don't know... I'm not even 18... much less 2000+

Answer 6

People werent any less intelligent than they are now, one only has to look at Mayan culture or the peoples from Egypt, the differences 2,000 years ago , is that much learning and study was centered upon religious themes, their entire lives were centered around the religion of the area.

Answer 7

I would say, NO, our civilization is based on their achievements, they where in evolution discovering all what they could, they used the available resources in a better way than we do. The intelligence of our ancestor and all their trials and failures built the legacy where our civilization and culture is based, unfortunately nowadays few people think on it and instead preserve and enrich all that legacy, we are destroying our planet forgetting  that.

Answer 8

No, but they thought differently than we did.

It was not less intelligent, just different.

Answer 9

There's a theory that ice-age people were more intelligent than people today.

Answer 10

They were less educated but just as wise.

Answer 11

They were just as intelligent,

but the aliens hadn't came yet to give the humans all this technology we're using today

Answer 12

I would have to say, given the lack of balanced diet, health care, and education that their brain function was far diminished compared to our own

Answer 13

NOT at all. They were smart enough to do what was necessary to get YOU HERE.

Intelligence is NOT the same as being educated. Intellegence is the ability to collect, store, and retieve knowledge and experiences to be applied in different and unique ways.

The ingenuity of the ancients is well known and documented. There are things about antiquity that we still to this day do not know how they did it. The Great Pyramids of Gisa are a start.

The only thing that kept the ancients back was their religious beliefs. But in retrospect, religion MAY have served a perfectly good purpose (I myself am an atheiest) in helping to organize people around certain methods and ways of life that had demonstrated over time to be a reliable means of insuring the common good of the people. It also set up a rigidity and caused untold destruction, loss, and human misery. It was certainly a two edged sword.

Answer 14

they were just as intelligent. if not more.

Answer 15

no, if you look at history it was all about s*x and violence...not much has changed since then.

Answer 16

Well, how intelligent a person is or was depends I suppose on the measure you are using. And may slightly depend upon what exactly thier environment and experiences are as well, I suppose. But it is unlikely that humanity was less intelligent 2000 years ago than we are now.

Generally speaking intelligence can be loosely defined as the processing of information (thinking) and precess experiences, learning, problem solving and understanding the uses and processes. Intelligence is not only the ability to critcally and abstractly think, reason and plan; it also reflects a broader and deeper capability for comprehending our surroundings—"catching on", "making sense" of things, or "figuring out" what to do.

It would be hard to imagine that people in the year 8 AD were less intelligent. There were plenty of inventions, and writings and other events that required huge amounts of not only educated knowledge but incredible capabilty for strategy in warfare, politics, medicine, philosophy, law, writing and more.

And in a fashion, history bears that out well. For example, about 2000 years ago (give or take a year or so):

·Rome was being run by Augustus and did not yet know it was about to lose big time to the Germanic tribes creating its newest border at the Rhine River.

·China was in the midst of the Han Dynasty (and had by this time invented several handy items like the compass and paper ).

·Christ was a p*****n, the apostle Paul was a toddler waddling around in Tarsus (modern Turkey) and Saint Peter was soon to be born in Israel.

·Cleopatra and Marc Antony's daughter had just died in Africa, leaving a huge mark on Caesaria (modern Algeria). Which means that a great deal of knowledge had already been stored up in the Library of Alexandria, which was about to lose one of it's most prolific inventors-- Heron. Much that had been gathered in Alexandria would be reintroduced to the world again in the Renaissance.

Intelligence generally is not something that is static within a given population. Currently we today usually refer to intelligence most often in reference to "I.Q" tests. IQ tests were originally devised specifically to predict educational achievement. These tests are controversial because they test only parts of a persons intelligence. I.Q. test results are often used or referred to as if they are static achievement levels, and unchanging or inflexible, which is not really accurate.

These tests have generally assumed scales of intelligence; most average people range between 85-100 on that scale. People who have greater capability, range higher than that. However, a persons "I.Q" does not necessarily mean that they are actually dumber or smarter. Many do not use or actively fulfill the potential "I.Q." numerics they are tested at, and some supercede it. Intelligence is not merely book learning, a narrow academic skill, or test-taking smarts even if that is how many  refer to it generally.

Answer 17

2000 years-drop in the ocean. Man was no less intelligent, but his circumstances were different.

heck, 4500 years ago peoplewere building the pyramids & Stonehenge, in two vastly different countries,and people still marvel and wonder about ttheir construction today. Could we build either, using similar methods today--unlikely. Could we even create the amazing gothic cathedrals of Europe's middle ages? I doubt that too.

  we have progressed in many ways, but lost too.

Answer 18

they were just ignorant

Answer 19

NO.

Answer 20

Yes, we have computers first of all to spread all are information. With new inventions it is easier to learn also so it makes it easier

Answer 21

We are nearly all nuts now, just look at the state of the USA, mostly over weight, starfucks, big mac, george shrub, war, religion and executions. Sure we have not learned a dam thing. The only good thing is women over 40 have become better looking.

Answer 22

Who could be less intelligent than George W. Bush?? lol  I have an eggplant in my refrigerator that's more intelligent than George W. Bush! lol  (Gonna get some thumbs down for this one!) lol

Answer 23

That would be your own opinion because  they did invent a lot of things we use today.

Answer 24

They are just as intelligent and genius appeared just as often. Two thousand years isn't much on the evolutionary scale of things.

What has changed is our technology. Two thousand years ago muscle power moved things, books were rare and transportation difficult.

Issac Newton said ""If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." He recognized that his advances were based on the work of others. Had they not done the preparation, he wouldn't have accomplished much.

Answer 25

I believe people were very intelligent but not educated. If you look at the way people survived, you will see how smart they were. They had to use their instincts to survive.

Answer 26

uhh... I don't see kids today being any smarter... most of them seem to be weird and s****.... we'll see if you post 2000 kids are smarter in next 20-60 yrs

Answer 27

no, by no means.

they were just less knowledgable about science and the world around them.

Answer 28

They were as intelligent as they needed to be for their times, for their fife styles, for their society.

Answer 29

Equal but did not have as much common knowledge.

Answer 30

Probably not inherently, though they may not have reached their full intellectual potential due to poor nutrition and their upbringing. But we see this in populations today too.

Answer 31

definately more. so much that has been invented was done 2000 years ago or more.the colliseum in rome is a world wonder that engineers today most likely could not duplicate and are still having difficulty understanding its schematics. the computer was invented by the greeks, the toilet by the minoans, etc etc. i have read that if the greek inventors such as heron of alexandria continued in their inventions such as with the rocket and steam we would now be in the year 4000 and highly advanced.