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pianoforte611 comments on Stupid Questions September 2015 - Less Wrong Discussion

4 Post author: polymathwannabe 02 September 2015 06:26PM

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Comment author: advancedatheist 03 September 2015 06:54:18AM 6 points [-]

How does it change your view of "the ascent of man" when you realize that only some human populations in the northern latitudes of Eurasia evolved enough intelligence to make way more than their share of contributions to the body of knowledge and the stock of high-value capital?

Comment author: pianoforte611 03 September 2015 01:36:36PM 8 points [-]

Well this certainly lives up to the discussion thread title. This is an ill posed question because it selectively carves out a very specific definition of human value for obviously ideological reasons. Why is capital the definitive measure of contributions to the human race? What about the wheel (Mesopotamians), what about fire (Africans - geographically, probably no one knows the taxonomy but certainly not northern Eurasians). What about geometry? Or perhaps something fairly important called numbers. Are those not knowledge?

Comment author: VoiceOfRa 07 September 2015 06:15:45PM 2 points [-]

Well this certainly lives up to the discussion thread title.

Sorry, this is not the ignorant replies thread.

What about the wheel (Mesopotamians)

the wheel was invented on the Eurasian steppe.

What about geometry?

Indo-Europeans (including Greeks) evolved on the Eurasian steppe and then spread out.

Or perhaps something fairly important called numbers.

See above point.