Michael Rose: UC Irvine Dept. of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology

Human behavior is unlike that of all other known animal behavior in its high degree of flexibility and versatility. A problem that is given less attention than it deserves is that flexible behavior is difficult to explain in Darwinian terms. “Free will” poses a challenge to the focus of Darwinian evolution: evolutionary fitness. With free will, individuals can choose to forego reproduction, choose to give away their resources, and so on. In this talk, a possible explanation for the evolution of such human free will is offered and the mechanism(s) by which it is constrained are considered.