Philosophical Vegan Forum

I feel like we (humans and animals) are screwed just because we evolved to an average IQ of 100. Imagine for a moment if we were 25 IQ points more or less intelligent (with not too much variance).

Dumber:
Too stupid to develop religion
Too stupid to develop slaughter houses and mass production techniques of animals
Too stupid to develop weapons of mass destruction
Too stupid to develop factories and machines that harm the environment

Smarter:
Too smart to be religious
Smart enough to see the individual and collective benefits of veganism and hopefully develop laws that punish non-vegan behaviors
Smart enough not to use weapons of mass destruction
Smart enough not to elect any more dumbass politicians

Hopefully, our planet will not be messed up beyond repair if/when we have evolved into an average IQ of 125

Really? The average is 100? I'm damned smart.

This graph is nice:



Anyway I do not think morality comes from intellect. I think, for example, that Genghis Khan was an absolute genius. He was also terrible.

Just wanted to point out that you could have said "humankind" in the title...

miniboes wrote: I do not think morality comes from intellect.

I think there is positive correlation between morality and intellect although there are exceptions to this. In any case, it is not relevant as none of my examples mention morality.

Jebus wrote:

miniboes wrote: I do not think morality comes from intellect.

I think there is positive correlation between morality and intellect although there are exceptions to this. In any case, it is not relevant as none of my examples mention morality.

Jebus wrote:Dumber:
Too stupid to develop slaughter houses and mass production techniques of animals

Smarter
Smart enough to see the individual and collective benefits of veganism and hopefully develop laws that punish non-vegan behaviors

It implies morality.

I don't think it's particularly useful to use IQ for making this case. The scores of people a century ago would have the average IQ of 70 if you would compare them with the IQ-tests of today. It's called the Flynn-effect, look it up if you like.

Raw intelligence also doesn't necessarily mean rationality.

Religiosity is inversely correlated with education, but there's not necessarily much correlation in terms of IQ.

Volenta wrote:I don't think it's particularly useful to use IQ for making this case. The scores of people a century ago would have the average IQ of 70 if you would compare them with the IQ-tests of today.

This is true as IQ tests are and will always be standardized to produce the median score of 100, but I can't think of any other way of phrasing it. I think most will read it and understand the numbers in current IQ measurements.

I remain adamant that my opening post clearly refers to intelligence and ability and not intelligence and morality.

Jebus wrote:

Volenta wrote:I don't think it's particularly useful to use IQ for making this case. The scores of people a century ago would have the average IQ of 70 if you would compare them with the IQ-tests of today.

This is true as IQ tests are and will always be standardized to produce the median score of 100, but I can't think of any other way of phrasing it. I think most will read it and understand the numbers in current IQ measurements.

I remain adamant that my opening post clearly refers to intelligence and ability and not intelligence and morality.

Your original post does talk about morality though.

Too smart to be religious
Smart enough to see the individual and collective benefits of veganism and hopefully develop laws that punish non-vegan behaviors
Smart enough not to use weapons of mass destruction
Smart enough not to elect any more dumbass politicians

Seeing the individual and collective benefits of veganism and developing laws that punish non-vegan behaviour is an act of ethical conduct. It doesn't need to be carried out because each and every person empathizes with animals; empathy is not the only form of morality and morality is not just a matter of emotion or sentiment. Morality is also about justice and reason. All of the above traits are those which would be more reasonable and more just actions, meaning they're absolutely about intelligence and morality. Whether they're done out of reasoned pragmatism or a strong, objective sense of right or wrong doesn't make it any more or less a moral issue.

Soycrates wrote:[
Seeing the individual and collective benefits of veganism and developing laws that punish non-vegan behaviour is an act of ethical conduct. It doesn't need to be carried out because each and every person empathizes with animals; empathy is not the only form of morality and morality is not just a matter of emotion or sentiment. Morality is also about justice and reason. All of the above traits are those which would be more reasonable and more just actions, meaning they're absolutely about intelligence and morality. Whether they're done out of reasoned pragmatism or a strong, objective sense of right or wrong doesn't make it any more or less a moral issue.

A moral action to me is simply one that in no way benefits yourself (or those close to you) and which benefits a person or animal with whom you may never have any contact. As any law that punishes non-vegan behavior would directly benefit the proponents of that law, I have a hard time seeing how this could be an example of morality.