Posted on 05/01/2013 12:06:27 PM PDT by fishtank
You can pick ANY start point. Humans today are taller, smarter, healthier and live longer.
We dig up human remains from all over the world and from many different times in human history. The average height made them shrimps compared to modern humans.
Height and intelligence are strongly correlated.
Our grandfather's generation, in their prime some 50-75 years ago (for most) were not as tall or as smart by any measure.
So YOU pick the time points.
And humans are not branching into sub-species. People have always mated associatively for height and intelligence and any number of other traits. Human populations are becoming less isolated as social taboos and cheap and easy worldwide travel have led to massive mixing of people.
A lot of white folks are embracing it as well.
Stupid people would starve and/or fail to reproduce.
God created survival-of-the-fittest and we must also obey it - one way or another.
No - just the leadership.
You mean the people that brought you the renaissance?
Watching NBC news your would think so.
The average Florintinian circa 1500 or so wouldn’t be a Leonardo or Benvenuto or a Machiavelli. Just as the average human today isn’t a Steve Jobs.
“Our grandfather’s generation, in their prime some 50-75 years ago (for most) were not as tall or as smart by any measure.”
The average Euro-American is shorter today than 150 yrs ago.
http://research.duke.edu/blog/2010/10/getting-shorter-and-fatter
There is no question that people across the world are getting higher IQ scores over time, to the extent they have to regularly re-norm the tests.
Why this is happening and what it means is a damn good question.
Well, no. The average American is 2 inches taller than then. But the average Euro is 8 inches taller than then.
We haven’t increased our height as much, probably because we were considerably taller than Euros back then.
In WWI multiple people commented on how the rankers in the British Army looked like a different people from the much taller and healthier officers. Malnutrition, probalbly.
You didn’t even click on the link did you?
Winston Churchill made it a point of argument because the average (mostly lower class) Englishman was of such inferior physicality than the average American.
Who knew 'Idiocracy' was a documentary?
Well, actually I did, since it’s where I got the stats I replied with.
During the Colonial times, Americans were the tallest in the world. In the case of the Industrial Revolution and the Antebellum Era, the heights of people in the industrialized countries were shrinking even when the average incomes were increasing.
“Total average height decreased during these periods; however this was not the case if you consider only the richer people. This was primarily because they were able to pay for their nutrition even when the prices of food were going up.”
“His research showed that the average height of the Dutch increased by almost 8 inches since the middle of the 19th century, compared to an increase of just 2 inches in the height of Americans.”
IOW, both Americans and Dutch are taller than 150 years ago, but Americans aren’t as MUCH taller, which is what I said.
Yes, because the stupid and weak ones don’t get eaten by animals anymore.
Yes, if our governments have anything to say about it.
““Total average height decreased during these periods; however this was not the case if you consider only the richer people. This was primarily because they were able to pay for their nutrition even when the prices of food were going up.”
I think you are taking that out of context.
That wouldn’t square with Americans being their tallest in the 1700’s, and they sure weren’t eating better or had better healthcare back then.
Every single study says Americans are getting shorter, not that Europe is getting taller. Europe may be getting taller, but that doesn’t have any effect on us shrinking.
Ping to self for future entertainment.
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