RE: Brain Size and Domestication
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This might be a dumb set of questions, I am just unfamiliar with this topic.
Does brain size always correlate to intelligence? Might a person with a big head simply have bigger bone, or fatty brain? Are there animals with bigger brains than humans? Do scientists ever measure the brain size of people with high IQ, and compare it to that of the average person?
Which people on earth generally have the largest brain sizes? Are they considered more intelligent, or is it uncertain due to their primitive culture they live in?
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It's not actually an unexpected question. Primates are different regarding how their brains are organized than any other animal. Whales have much larger brains than humans, but they don't have that many more neurons, because in most animals the neurons are larger the larger their brains are. Also, the acoustic portions of their brains are massively larger than the part of human brains devoted to sound. Different parts of the brain serve different functions, and the part(s) of the brain dedicated to rational thought aren't necessarily more complex in whales.
It's hard to tell though, because we can't ask them.
In primates the larger the brain of the animal is the more neurons it has. This is unique amongst animals, and is most evident in our genus Homo. However, it's impossible to be sure what parts of the brains of our ancestors were larger, because we don't actually have fossil brains. We have fossil braincases, which only show their brains were larger than our own.
The most significant reduction in brain size in the chickens in the study was in the brain stem, which the researchers reckon not associated with reason and logic. Of course, I don't associate chickens with reason and logic whatsoever, so that's sort of ... wait for it... a no brainer.
Edit: LOL I forgot to answer some of your questions because I was too busy giggling. The intelligence of primate species, particularly hominids, is generally linked to brain size, however across individual specimens of the species there are a great many factors that affect intelligence, in addition to having a brain capable of mental acuity. I recall Einstein had a rather moderately sized brain, although he was clearly highly intelligent.
I'm unaware of data in which I have any confidence that indicates folks in one region or another, or of particular heritages, are hyperintelligent.
I do know folks, though, that aren't.
Thanks for the great response.
All this talk about having chicken brains...
I might even beg to add that the ability to make people laugh with the quip of words is a mark of high intelligence.