• Question: How do people get smarter and smarter through evolution?

    Asked by racoon3456 to Aimee, Gemma, Hussain, Robert, Ross on 18 Nov 2015.
    • Photo: Hussain Jaffery

      Hussain Jaffery answered on 18 Nov 2015:

      Our evolution in the past allowed us to have better brains to solve problems and ensure our survival. This happened purely because, on average, ‘smart’ the individuals survived better and passed on their genes and features of ‘smartness’ to their children, for many, many generations. The result being, the modern Homo sapiens sapiens. This was a process where smarts were directly helping survival, and so we ended up smart.

      There is no evolutionary way to make us artificially smarter, as we are no longer under the pressures of survival. I think a good way to get smarter nowadays would be learn as much as you can, and be interested in everything, especially science! 😉

    • Photo: Robert Lees

      Robert Lees answered on 19 Nov 2015:

      It’s probably to do with the size of the outer layer of the brain – the cerebral cortex (means brain outer layer). It has increased through evolution, but there is not a great deal of difference amoung different humans. This part of the brain is important in sensing, thinking and behaviour. People are still gathering evidence for this sort of thing, but the clues so far point to bigger cerebral cortex = greater ability to carry out sensing, thinking etc. which makes people smarter.

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