Intentional cultural change

•Evolution adapts organisms to their environments but is not goal directed.•Nevertheless, evolution results in goal-directed behaviors.•Human cultural evolution has both goal-directed non-goal directed components.•Future cultural evolution must become more goal-directed.

As a process of blind variation and selective retention, evolution lacks intentionality. Nevertheless, intentional processes can be a product of evolution and can double back to effect evolution. This article briefly describes how intentional processes evolve, how they figure in human cultural evolution, and how future cultural evolution needs to become more intentional.