The Interest of Reason in a World in Evolution

Abstract

The question on the origin and the nature of reason has been placed in an evolutionary framework. This means that the question ‘why is there reason?’ should be answered by reconstructing the stages of the evolutionary process. Only in this way we can get to know the causes (previous physical and biological states) which produced the emergence of reason. Moreover, the question ‘what is the nature of reason and how does it work?’ is also the result of an evolutionary study of its origin. We could say that our knowledge of the ontology of reason depends on our knowledge of how it has emerged in the evolutionary process. The same is true of its functions: they depend on reason’s ontology and on its adaptive function in order to survive as an instrument of evolution in an objective world.