Min, I feel like we're in a rowing boat and you're asking me "Where's the sea?" ~ and so showing it doesn't really lend itself to soundbites.Minimalist wrote:I'd love to see where they say that, Ish, if you could exert yourself to find it.There are many others ... and they stupidly believe that evolution of the species must mean "getting better and better every single day in every single way", including cognition.
But here are couple of examples, the first one from the Intelligence page of Wikipedia which states very emphatically:
In other words, they are making the link between between brain size and intelligence, which is complete fallacy, and an ever-evolving brain size which means, according to this belief system ((I cannot call it science), an ever-evolving intelligence.Our hominid and human ancestors evolved large and complex brains exhibiting an ever-increasing intelligence through a long and mostly unknown evolutionary process. This process was either driven by the direct adaptive benefits of intelligence[46], or − alternatively − driven by its indirect benefits within the context of sexual selection as a reliable signal of genetic resistance against pathogens.[47]
And this may also help. Here Robert Bednarik, in praising John Feliks' paper The Graphics of Bilzingsleben (which is still being held up in the scientific review process), refers to this paradigm:
As John says on his webpage about this as yet unpublished paper.“Absolutely outstanding and stunning. You have single-handedly demonstrated that the cognition and intellect of these hominins may have been of an order entirely unexpected by all of us... breathtaking... Yours is a landmark contribution, and I congratulate you most cordially and sincerely.”
The belief system is influenced by Darwin's Origin of Species thus:The underlying premise of The Graphics of Bilzingsleben is that there has been no change whatsoever in human cognitive ability for at least 400,000 years. This statement is quite easily extended back at least 1.4 to 1.8 million years, and, in fact, to whatever point in time we choose to assign the first appearance of the genus Homo. The Graphics of Bilzingsleben fully counters any popular science claims such as the "Flynn Effect," etc., that human intelligence as relates to the genus as a whole has ever increased gradually over time. As noted above, the idea of cognitive evolution is a central axiom (definition 3) of modern anthropology so it influences in a very important way everything issued forth not only from anthropology but from any fields associated with anthropology such as genetics, psychology, or neuroscience.
Hope this helps.The idea that human cognitive ability evolves gradually comes straight from Darwin's 1859 proclamation that each mental capability will be shown to have been necessarily acquired by "gradation" (Charles Darwin, The Origin of Species, 1859, page 488.)Why would any scientifically-educated person question that statement? This is the whole point, they can't.