The age of dinosaurs lasted for millions of years.  Yet at some point, many millions of years ago, there was a cataclysmic event that caused mass extinctions over the next 3 months.  The death of large dinosaurs allowed mammals to spread into vacant environmental niches.   Have you ever wondered, Why mammals?  Why didn’t small dinosaurs take back the planet rather than evolving into birds?  Why not lizards?  Insects were (and still are) far more prolific, why didn’t they grow to fill the environmental niches left in the wake of the dinosaurs?  What is so special about being a mammal? 

Whatever happened, it dramatically changed the environment over a short period.  The mammals at that age were a small shrew that developed a little brain that wasn’t purely filled with instinctual knowledge (it had instincts, but probably wasn’t 100% preloaded).  It had an ability to observe its environment and modify its behaviour to new conditions.  All creatures can do this, but because mammals aren’t as specialized in specific survival strategies as other creatures, they have more variety in the behaviours they can perform.  Their brain gave them a little more ability to shift their behaviour.  Lack of specialization gave our little shrew the ability to “move in” on a vacant environmental niche by adjusting its behaviours a long time before their bodies could evolve into more specialized strategies.  Creatures with instincts could only change once ever generation.  The ability to learn and change strategies within their lifespan gave mammals a huge competitive advantage.

            Having a flexible mind turned out to be a neat trick and allowed the mammalian brain to spread across the planet like wildfire.  A few million years later it shows up in all higher life forms becoming bears, elephants, tigers, kangaroos, giraffes, and whales.  Generalization means lack of specialization.  Observing the environment and being open to learning new strategies meant you couldn’t be born preloaded with knowledge or using special strategies.

            Somewhere in Africa, a little monkey became a specialist in “generalization.”  It may have started as a tree dwelling creature (and had a tail) but became adapted to living on the planes.  It developed a biped locomotion allowing it to detect threats early and was quite good at long distance running.  This allowed it to outpace most predators.  They were also fair swimmers and reasonable climbers possessing different strategies to escape.  It also developed omnivorous eating patterns, taking advantage of a variety of different food sources.  More important than their body was their mind.  They were curious, always alert for new and better ways of doing things.  They found they became far more dangerous in groups than as an individual, so they refined the ability to share complex ideas with each other… this led to complex language.

            When a specialist creature (like a spider) makes a mistake, it usually ends up dead.  The more specialized it is, the more it is “locked into” a specific survival strategy.  Humans are the masters of being general.  We are the most versatile, multi-cellular creature on the planet.   We exist miles under the ocean, in arctic conditions, in deserts, even in outer space.  No other large creature has this kind of flexibility.  Our planetary population is currently at 7 billion making us far from the endangered species.  Our biggest threat is from ourselves.

            You, as a human being, are a generalist creature.  You have the ability to change your behaviours if you so choose to do so.  You can make mistakes and learn from them.  You also have the freedom to do the same thing over and over again if you like.  This is what it means to have “Free Will.”