From Instinct to Reason: The Evolution of Human Explanation

Instinctive Behavior Versus Human Rationality

Animal behavior is instinctive, innate, and fixed by biological laws common to all species. Instincts enable animals to meet all their needs, providing practical and concrete knowledge for adaptation and survival.

The human being, however, is characterized by the need to go beyond mere instinctive adaptation. Humans have been branded as rational animals, needing to understand, interpret, and know the environment in which they live.

The Nature of Mythological Explanations

Mythological explanations are based on supernatural elements. Their origin lies in the emotional and imaginative activity of humans. Mythology uses symbolic representations, making it possible for man to build the image of his own world through reasoning by analogy.

Stages of Mythological Explanation

1. Fetishism or Animism: Life, similar to human life but more powerful, is attributed to material objects.
2. Polytheism: The ultimate explanation is attributed to various supernatural beings who are superior to men and are able to influence their world.
3. Monotheism: All phenomena depend on the will of a single, omnipotent supernatural being.

From Myth to Philosophy: The Greek Transition

In Greece, mythological stories ceased to serve as an explanatory model because it was impossible to learn the regularities that govern nature through them.

The deeply rooted idea among the ancient Greeks was destiny—the belief in a mysterious power governing the universe and dominating even the gods. This irrational belief gave way to the idea of necessity: the belief that things happen when and how they must happen, which can be known and predicted.

This shift spurred the desire to explain natural reality through the sole use of reason, leading to a kind of rational and immanent explanation.

The Foundations of Rational Knowledge

Human reason asks about what things are (essence) and what produces them (cause). In reality, there is something permanent and constant (substance) despite the changes shown by the senses. Rational knowledge helps to explain one phenomenon by another phenomenon, and the ability to reach one phenomenon from another is called the method.