The Human Brain Is Decreasing Over Time!

Evolution in humans is commonly thought to have essentially stopped in recent times. But there are plenty of examples that the human race is still evolving, including our brains, and there are even signs that our evolution may be accelerating.

Shrinking brains

Comprehensive scans of the human genome reveal that hundreds of our genes show evidence of changes during the past 10,000 years of human evolution.
"We know the brain has been evolving in human populations quite recently," said a paleoanthropologist.
Surprisingly, based on skull measurements, the human brain appears to have been shrinking over the last 5,000 or so years.

"When it comes to recent evolutionary changes, we currently maybe have the least specific details with regard the brain, but we do know from archaeological data that pretty much everywhere we can measure — Europe, China, South Africa, Australia — that brains have shrunk about 150 cubic centimeters, off a mean of about 1,350. That's roughly 10 percent," the paleoanthropologist said.

"As to why is it shrinking, perhaps in big societies, as opposed to hunter-gatherer lifestyles, we can rely on other people for more things, can specialize our behavior to a greater extent, and maybe not need our brains as much," he added.

Later in the video and shown from different perspectives is an 8 centimeter high carving of a human face on mammoth ivory that has been dated to 26,000 years ago. A number of human likenesses carved, like this one on mammoth ivory, have been found in central Europe but none so intricate. The object shown here is the oldest portrait of a human yet discovered. It shows exquisite details of the subject, including eyes, hair, mouth, and expression. According to anthropologists whove studied the skulls of the humans of this period, they had bigger brains and more robust skulls, as well as heavier brow ridges and jaws, and thicker noses. These traits are typical of archaic skulls as seen here. The average prognathism in the Paleolithic samples is also greater than in modern populations, and probably has a lot to do with the much larger teeth humans had prior to the Neolithic farming revolution. Other art objects from around this period also show the early Europeans represented with straight hair.

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[erlcly02]

can anyome tell me what was the title of the song(piano) in the last clip?

[koko4u2luv]

@erlcly02 Sonata For Piano No. 14 Moonlight Sonata by Adagio Sostenuto

Original artist is Beethoven

[humanB100]

Does anyone have the details of this lecture?

Who is the professor and when was this?

[koko4u2luv]

@humanB100 The professor's name is John Hawks.  The lecture was given in 2009. This was only a clip. You can watch the rest of the lecture at this youtube address: watch?v=CUo6cop4vXg

Also John Hawks website is johnhawksDOTnet

[hotwhire]

The music industry is proof human brains are shrinking

[jbearden]

It's not JUST brain size, but also COMPLEXITY.

[TicTocKnight]

@alexgrinkov You are fundamentally incorrect, the same phenomena can be found within cows and sheep post domestication. The decrease in conflict and independence required to survive reduces brain size. The brain does not use all of its matter but has unused space to allow the mind to adapt to new hostile changes as an independent. Also IQ tests do not measure adaptability of the brain, but a comparison between individuals. IQ tests have not been stable and do not capture pre IQ test results.

[cincofone]

@antioxidants87 I also don't see how you're reading my comments as me being mad, I'm just trying to explain the concept of correlation to you - you're implying that muscle size has nothing to do with muscle strength. Look at the lifts for different weight divisions in weightlifting - it correlates with body/muscle mass. I know you can train to lift large weights without increasing muscle mass much, that doesn't mean it has 0 to do with it.

[cincofone]

@antioxidants87 It's a fairly weak correlation between the two (0.25), so it's not everything. Yes a bodybuilder has trouble doing pullups but they have to lift far more weight doing a pull up than you or I. Lifting the same amount of weight (by bench pressing etc.) they'll most likely dominate (especially if you take large sample sizes).

I don't have a PhD, and I don't see why you're so intent on calling me stupid - I actually agree with you on a lot of points.

[jimbojones888]

10,000 BC was the end of the last ice age, that could have something to do with the shrinking brain

[alexgrinkov]

@SgtThom

Are you retarded? I was talking about humans (repeated it two times), not rats vs. chimps. Slight variation of humans' brain size doesn't affect intelligence.

[cincofone]

@SgtThom Since the mental health movement has started medicating people with anti-depressants (especially SSRIs) and anti-psychotics the number of hospitalised mental patients has skyrocketed. The correlations are uncanny.

[SgtThom]

@cincofone

U tard. Intelligence is determine in the frontal lobe of Humans. I believe we shrink in other parts of the brain because we grow to be more smaller. Nothing to do with intelligence. The last sentence is probably pulled from your ass

[SgtThom]

@alexgrinkov

Brain size does not only contribute to intelligence. Are ability to see colors? Take up a hell of a lot of neurons to make. Larger muscle mass? More neurons. Having larger brains does is quality but that quality is not always intelligence. But you are pulling that out of your ass.

[cincofone]

@alexgrinkov Also why the hostile tone? You seem to have disdain for those who think differently to you - you must have tons of friends acting like that.