You know, like being tall, or having an extra finger, or being prone to certain hereditary diseases. For obvious reasons, humanity's exponential development of this particular trait put us far ahead of the rest of the mammalian kingdom. It is unpredictable, impenetrable, and relatively unquantifiable. Two "intelligent" parents are just as likely to give birth to an idiot as they are to create a genius. Crazy, yeah? What does it mean to be intelligent, anyway? It expresses itself in an infinite number of ways, so how can we say with any certainty who is smarter than whom? I think the use of tools really helped exacerbate our intelligence as well. I'm high so if that didn't make sense...to bad
Well your intelligence is anything but genetic, your nurture will create your intelligence, as well as all other behaviors you adapt. If you look at feral children, they are so primitive due to lack of socialization that it is hard to accept that they are really human, even though they are just as human as anyone else (from a biological standpoint).
Haha man this kind of stuff fascinates me, i've been really digging my sociology course lately, first class i've enjoyed in a long time.
If intelligence was only in socialization a baby would not be able to learn the words to be socialized. Intelligence comes from connections between different sensory neurons. Being able to connect neurons temporarily is short-term memory and making lasting connections is long-term memory. Each thought is a sensory perception. When a person connects two things and translates that into words, they just created a connection between two senses that can be interpreted and connected by another. Through specialization we create individualized connections between neurons, that may or may not continue through generations. But if they are continued through generations, those connections will eventually become incorporated into the DNA and be made during development.
All of our DNA's are "slightly" different. Level of intelligence is included if not the point. One monkey had a higher level of intelligence, then passed that along to all of us. Who's to say that won't happen again?
It is genetic in the sense that every human has a certain level of intelligence(lets define that as the potential/ capacity for learning) due to the evolution of the brain . Your intelligence doesn't solely rely on nurture because you cannot nurture lesser animals to learn many of the things we can. Our brains have evolved to have the capicity for greater learning and understanding
You're absolutely right, it would be impossible for lesser animals to learn what we can. However, human intelligence, in terms of what you know or what you do, is completely nurture. I thought OP was referring to intelligence differences between humans in the same sociological conditions, not animals on a general scale. For example, me and my friends, how we have different intelligence levels, as opposed to people vs elephants or something.
Evolution didn't happen that fast at all though. The reason you and I have different intelligence levels is not based on our genetics, but our nurture. We may have different predispositions to learning capabilities, but a predisposition is not a predetermination, therefore if the required criteria is not met, the predisposition will not have any effect on an individual.
Environment can make a person desire certain connections. DNA gives connections intuitively. Ability to make quick connections, lasting connections, large amounts of connections, and/or certain types of connections(some analogous, differential, quantitative, communicative, processing, etc.) are all given to individuals in different quantities at birth due to DNA. Any human can work on these abilities due to their desires. Perhaps making them intuitive to their offspring.
I'm Talking about Intelligence being an evolutionary thing, kinda like....sonar for bats, or shells for turtles. Not the degree of intelligence based on nurture.....if that makes sense
Connections don't necessarily mean "intelligence", but they don't necessarily don't. This is because of the extrasensory perception of thoughts. It is what it is: a connection.
Don't forget to take into account how each generation sees a raise in IQ from their previous generation.
The Flynn effect: Human Intelligence: The Flynn Effect WOW I'm amazed that this article is hosted on my favorite schools server!
i see where you're going but its just not the whole point. our "intelligence" is not a collective set of skills (talking, critical thinking, so on and so forth), it is the ability to pick up new skills and remember past experiences. honestly most of it comes down to memory and short term memory, if it wasnt for that we couldnt learn from experiences and we couldnt learn from another person. intelligence has nothing to do with the skills we pick up, rather the ability to pick said skills up. the IQ is not a measure of brains, its a measure of how easily someone can gain knowledge about their environment. you can nurture someone to so they get the most out of things but, if they are mentally retarded it doesnt matter how much you nurture them... they just wont get it.