If the human brain is highly evolved and that the survival of our species critically hinges on a sufficient objective understanding of the natural world, then why is it so susceptible to imaginative and inaccurate models of thinking? Think about how some credulous religious fanatics can kill thousands of people for an anticipation of heaven promised by their god – concepts/beliefs that never resulted from objective and rational understanding…purely imaginary. Less extreme examples of the credulity of the human brain are everywhere so that we can almost say that it really has a tendency to be uncritical, subjective, and even anti-realistic.
From the evolutionary point of view, perhaps a completely objective view of the world is not critical to our survival in the short term. A crude and partially realistic view of the world is probably enough to manage the survival of our species for a few thousands of years. We cannot prolong our survival though with these kinds of models of understanding the natural world. In the long run, we need to be more realistic in assessing the workings of nature. Without the efforts of science to fight plagues and diseases, for instance, through serious study of their causes and cures, our species might have already been wiped out from the face of the earth. If we are to continue to survive as a species for the next thousand or million years, we should evolve to a more rational and objective species. This has been happening throughout human history. The challenge now is on how to accelerate this transformation so we can attain peaceful coexisting rational “ideologies” before we destroy each other in a series of offensive and vindictive attacks resulting from ancient unrealistic and anti-progressive ideas.
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