Is Mankind (not the ESB poster, although it may applt to him as well ) in general smarter today than yesterday or pretty much the same? Current humans build upon the knowledge base of their predecessors, and information increases at ever-faster rates in shorter periods, but that does not necessarily correlate with humanity being "smarter." Was an Isaac Newton, Galileo, Plato, DaVinci, Washinton, Dante, Gates, Jobs, Hawking, or some other citizen of a historical time, etc. smarter than yesteryear' s or today's crop of scientists, inventors, philosophers? Did/do they have more insight into people, science, and such? Is there any evidence or have there been any such studies? Discuss...
No, it does not belong in the general boxing forum...Ooops! My bad...cardinal sin. Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxa culpa!!!
Wrong forum, but I'm drunk, so I'll answer: Yes, we are just as smart, if not smarter overall.. more people with easier access to higher learning. The thing is there just isn't the "rockstar" Newton's and Eistein's out there, but people as smart or smarter than them? Yes.
Knowledge can obviously flow more freely now. Anyone can educate themselves with everyday technology. Except when TV and video games takes over people lives! Today's scientists draw upon advances of the past and better them, it's a continuous process. I don't think there is anything in the water making us any smarter or any dumber. I could say there are more knowledgeable people than anytime before but that can also be somewhat watered down by media distractions.
I think the smart people are smarter but the dumb people are dumber. Smart people know how the electronics in a calculator work, then know and understand the principals behind the calculations. The dumb people need the calculator to do the simplest of arithmetic. And there are way more dumb people then there are smart ones. So if you averaged it out, I'd say we are dumber. Also, dumb people reproduce at greater rates then smart ones (like in the movie Idiocracy).
