= 27d567bc2d48d9f40e9ccc20ea370b15)
Lumifer comments on Open Thread for February 18-24 2014 - Less Wrong
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
= 783df68a0f980790206b9ea87794c5b6)
Loading…= b715d02e85f7b3b4ae65ca3d3e450868)
Subscribe to RSS Feed
Powered by Reddit
= f037147d6e6c911a85753b9abdedda8d)
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Comments (454)
East Asians (and specifically Han Chinese) were never called White.
No, but I suspect that the necessity to survive the winter led to increased evolutionary pressures.
Perhaps, on the other hand the places where civilizations first developed, i.e., Egypt, the Fertile Crescent, the Indus Valley, Central America, don't have harsh winters; I'm not sure about the Yellow River, but my brief Googling suggested their winters aren't that harsh either.
The best geography/climate to develop a civilization is not necessarily the best geography/climate to produce high intelligence. Early civilizations arose in places where agriculture was productive enough to generate significant surplus.
I would hardly consider places like the valley of the Congo or Australia or the Sahara to be evolutionarily soft.
Evolution can push development into different directions. Winters promote long-term thinking and planning. The Congo basin probably promotes resistance to parasites and infections....