A1 Refereed original research article in a scientific journal

The evolution of Homo Discens: natural selection and human learning




AuthorsOsmo Kivinen, Tero Piiroinen

PublisherBlackwell Publishing Ltd

Publication year2018

JournalJournal for the Theory of Social Behaviour

Journal name in sourceJournal for the Theory of Social Behaviour

Volume48

Issue1

First page 117

Last page133

Number of pages17

ISSN0021-8308

eISSN1468-5914

DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1111/jtsb.12157

Web address https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/jtsb.12157

Self-archived copy’s web addresshttps://research.utu.fi/converis/portal/detail/Publication/30309520


Abstract

This article takes an evolutionary “reverse engineering” standpoint on Homo discens, learning man, to track down the (learning) mechanisms that played a pivotal role in the natural selection of human being. The approach is “evolutionary sociological”—as opposed to gene‐centred or psychologising—and utilises notions of co‐evolutionary organism–environment transactions and niche construction. These are compatible with a Deweyan theory of action, which entails that in action one cannot but learn and one can only learn in action. Special attention is paid to apprentice‐like learning‐by‐doing peculiar to human socio‐cultural niches since the Pleistocene, which has permitted each subsequent generation to learn the many habits and skills needed in utilising the affordances of action that constitute their ecological niche. Affordances and actions have changed over the history of human–environment transactions, but the core mechanisms of human learning have not changed much. It is increasingly important to appreciate these mechanisms now in the global age “knowledge society,” which is in a way similar to the Pleistocene era: characterised by uncertainty and life‐determining problem‐situations without any ready‐made solutions, it calls for capacities to adapt to changing circumstances, and thus apprentice‐like learning in action supported by savvy epistemological engineering of learning environments.


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