More or less

Time is linear to the Western world and attached to it are assumptions of time as a progressive transformer. Concepts of intelligence are based on linear forward movement over time. There is no evidence, and certainly no proof, that the longer humans live the more human or the more intelligent they become. According to the Western world the farther backward in time people travel the less intelligent the humanity, as though having travelled through two millennia of arbitrary clock ticking somehow makes us more or less intelligent. It doesn't occur to Western science that perhaps the Neanderthals used their whole brain; it is already a matter of record that current humans do not. While the Neanderthals' brain size may have occupied less space, their realization or thoughtfulness might have been much greater than we imagine.

"Sharing Space and Time," in Memory Serves: Oratories by Lee Maracle