Comment · Thu, December 27, 2012
Engraved stone dating back 30,000 years found in China. Incisions imply possibility of counting or recording?
What they were answering
oceanplexian · 3 points
The OP said
They were still smart just didn't have all the accumulated knowledge we have today.
That statement still holds true.
Just because they didn't have access to accumulated knowledge (math, music, science), it doesn't mean they weren't as developed as us. Ancient human civilization may have been equally as skilled at raw problem solving or critical thinking skills as we are today.
30k years is an incredibly small period on the evolutionary timescale. Chances are their brain "structure", at birth, is pretty damn similar to ours. They just didn't have the access to the same amount of accumulated knowledge.
u/MisterYouAreSoDumb
Yes, I completely agree. My statement was more of an addition with regards to an adult in that time period compared to one in ours. The regions of the brain associated with various activities like survival and problem solving may have had more neural connections than those of the average modern human. However, there are physical changes to the structure of the brain that arise from nutritional and stimulatory factors in a human's adolescence. Growing up in modern society involves a much more varied set of mental simulations, as well as much different nutritional supplementation. But yes, that all arises due to the access to the accumulated knowledge we have that they did not. I think a baby from that time period, being raised in ours, would turn out pretty much the same as a modern child.