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How Smart Are We?


Tebok

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Mankind has come a long way in understanding the universe around it.

 

Do you think there are things out there that we will never grasp - not because we will never discover it - but because it is far beyond our mental capacity to understand?

 

Think of a little mouse. The mouse can easily figure out that it will get food by pressing the little lever within its cage. However, the same mouse will never be able to figure out how to build a nuclear reactor. Also, trying to explain to the mouse - in every feasible way - what a nuclear reactor does will be completely pointless. The mouse will know nothing more about the reactor regardless of how many days you spent trying to explain it. It just does not have the mental capacity.

 

Like the mouse and the nuclear reactor, do you think there mysteries in the universe that the human race simply cannot grasp or even imagine?

 

Oh, I don't mean Alien technology - I mean just the workings of the universe in general.

Edited by Tebok
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We assume the scale of intelligence goes higher, even if we consider ourselves to be the smartest species we know. I like that, it seems to add some humility to an often arrogant approach to intelligence.

 

The mouse analogy may just be pattern recognition, something else we're amazing at. We see a pattern of high intelligence species trying to teach less intelligent species and getting nowhere, and assume there's something more intelligent than us that would have the same problems trying to teach us. I don't like this as much, since it's very easy to find patterns and assume they're meaningful.

 

If there are concepts that are currently as far above our intellectual grasp as a nuclear reactor is to a mouse, it's hard to imagine them. Our methodology for understanding the underlying mechanisms of the universe is pretty solid, and while there are many things we don't know, I think we have the right way to figure them out most effectively.

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I wouldn't say the mouse doesn't have the mental capacity it’s more like it doesn't think or should I say the way we humans think. Human brain is still a mystery and no one knows the potential of it. It’s like comparing similar ages of people and saying the human race just do not have the potential judging with the least intelligent of the compared people. Come on we have come far from a stone wheel to this modern era. Brain size did not change but the way we see things have changed in a large scale. So I am very positive humans have the potential for all the mysteries.

Edited by DeathShallWait
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Mankind has come a long way in understanding the universe around it.

 

Do you think there are things out there that we will never grasp - not because we will never discover it - but because it is far beyond our mental capacity to understand?

 

Think of a little mouse. The mouse can easily figure out that it will get food by pressing the little lever within its cage. However, the same mouse will never be able to figure out how to build a nuclear reactor. Also, trying to explain to the mouse - in every feasible way - what a nuclear reactor does will be completely pointless. The mouse will know nothing more about the reactor regardless of how many days you spent trying to explain it. It just does not have the mental capacity.

 

Like the mouse and the nuclear reactor, do you think there mysteries in the universe that the human race simply cannot grasp or even imagine?

 

Oh, I don't mean Alien technology - I mean just the workings of the universe in general.

Your "mouse" example is very good. Except in this respect - the mouse doesn't understand language.

 

Therefore, it can't receive communications in language. That makes it useless as a creature to speak to. Anyway, its brain is too small for complex thinking.

 

I agree with DSW in #3 - humans have the potential to solve all mysteries. Provided we use our brains properly, and don't get diverted by sex and religion.

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