Many Minds | 3 February 2021 | 1h 29m | Listen Later 
| iTunes
Interview with Michael Muthukrishna about why our brains got so big; how culture makes us smart; where innovation comes from; the cultural brain hypothesis; what this means for a general theory of intelligence across species; explaining the Flynn Effect; how group size and interconnectedness power culture; the evolution of brain size in humans & cetaceans; why psychology needs to become a historical science; and more.
This episode was so insightful that I went looking for more. The episode with Michael Muthukrishna on The Dissenter is also very good.
Postscript: Michael Muthukrishna’s book, A Theory of Everyone, is now available for pre-order. I’ve ordered my copy. I believe this will be the best and most significant book of 2023.
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The discussion of IQ as a cultural matter (and thereby at least partially explaining the Flynn Effect) around minute 43 is very illuminating. His five year-old would give the correct answer right away as a matter of abstract reasoning, but in fact the Uzbek would be right about the predominant colour of bears in Siberia.