"One is a kind of a mechanistic set of explanations, right? You know, how does my immune system work? You know, how do my muscles work? You know, how does my brain, you know, create memories, and how do I speak, et cetera. That's the kind of bread and butter of most aspects of biology. But our bodies weren't designed. They weren't engineered. They're not machines. They evolved."
"And, so, if you want to understand why we do what we do, why our brains work the way they do, why our feet work the way they do, why we run, you know, why our immune systems function the way they do, the only explanation for those sorts of questions is an evolutionary question, you know, 'cause evolution explains why things are the way they are."
Human biology requires mechanistic explanations for processes such as immunity, muscle function, memory formation, and speech. Evolution supplies ultimate explanations for why features and functions exist, accounting for traits like brain organization, foot structure, running ability, and immune responses. Evolutionary explanations identify selective pressures and historical constraints that shaped traits over time. Complete explanations must integrate proximate process-level mechanisms with evolutionary 'why' explanations. Cultural and anthropological perspectives are essential to understand human behavior because culture shapes behavioral patterns, norms, and environments. Explanations of exercise, diet, language, and other human traits require synthesis of physiology, evolutionary theory, and anthropology.
Read at Big Think
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]