Evolution and the human mind: The evolution of knowledge

By David Papineau. 2000

89 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Human beings are one of the great success stories of evolution. They have spread over the globe and refashioned much of it to their own convenience. What has made this possible? Perhaps there is no one key which alone explains why humans have come to dominate nature. But a crucial part has surely been played by our high potential for theoretical rationality. Human beings far surpass other animals in their ability to form accurate beliefs across a wide range of topics, and many aspects of human civilization rest on this accomplishment. My aim in this paper will be to explain this ability from an evolutionary perspective. I want to understand how beings with our biological history came to be so good at theoretical rationality.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Cultural Studies, History and Philosophy of Science

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/3aca07bbdbefa484bfd480546cffac1c4b9a6afc

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Astronomy and Astrophysics

1. Dale W. Griffin
2. Thomas Gilovich

In Cultural Studies

1. Dale W. Griffin
2. Thomas Gilovich

In History and Philosophy of Science

1. Dale W. Griffin
2. Thomas Gilovich
3. Daniel Kahneman
4. G. Pallier

Citations in the corpus

• Heuristics and Biases: Introduction – Heuristics and Biases: Then and Now (2002, background): “It is no accident that most of the ‘irrationality’ experiments trade in probabilities” (Papineau, 2000, p. 182).”