Carlos Blanco, researcher of the Institute for Culture and Society (ICS) of the University of Navarra, analyzes in a article from an evolutionary perspective the capacity of human beings to recognize what is true and what is false. The interdisciplinary scientific journal Scientia et Fides has published in its second issue the work, graduate Truth in an Evolutionary Perspective. The group 'Mente-cerebro' of the ICS, to which Dr. Blanco belongs, receives funding from the Obra Social "La Caixa".

Through more than 25 references - from the writings of Charles Darwin to the scientific treatises of Johann Wolfgang Goethe - the researcher explores the knowledge of natural history, the Genetics, evolutionary forces and the concept of truth.

Specifically, Carlos Blanco examines the difficulties presented by the prevailing biological model of the mind development "in its attempt to construct a philosophical theory of truth" and proposes to reconcile the philosophical foundations of truth with the scientific evidence on the evolutionary origin of our ability to discern it.

The scholar concludes that the only plausible explanation for why the forces guiding the processes of evolution are compatible with the autonomy of the knowledge of truth is that biological adaptation has led to human beings being able to recognize the distinction between true and false. In his view, this depends "on the intelligibility of the world, which is pre-existent or at least appears together with evolutionary forces".

Recognize the patterns that govern nature.

"Reconciling the primacy - in Darwin's theory - of biological efficiency as the natural force of evolution requires accepting that the evolutionary development has led to the emergence of a set of mental capacities that are structured in such a way that we can recognize the patterns that govern nature," he points out.

Carlos Blanco is graduate in Philosophy, Chemical Sciences and Theology (2007), and PhD in Philosophy and in Theology. In addition to his work at the ICS, he collaborates with teaching activities at School of Philosophy and Letters. In 2009, with a scholarship from the Caja Madrid Foundation, he spent a year at Harvard University (USA). He is a member of the International Association of Egyptologists and the Spanish Leibniz Society. Next year he will join the department of Philosophy of the Universidad Pontificia de Comillas.

Scientia et Fides is an online journal promoted by the School of Theology of the Nicolaus Copernicus University of Torun (Poland) in partnership with the group of research Science, Reason and Faith (CRYF) of the University of Navarra. The publication, of which the physicist and theologian Javier Sánchez-Cañizares is Deputy Director , focuses on research that analyzes the relationship between science and religion.

The article on line:

http://wydawnictwoumk.pl/czasopisma/index.php/SetF/article/view/SetF.2014.012