As far as human evolution is concerned... Evolution is about survival not enlightenment. Intelligence may well be an evolutionary dead end which nature is now abandoning.

If there were any signs of human intelligence having evolved, then you'd have a point. Humans evolved to what we understand as human when we understood and acknowleged the 3 great truths;

1. We are of the Earth; so we are 'nature' altho' we are now 'on' it, (not 'above' it, a phrase of Julian's I don't care for) rather than where we were, 'in' it, like most life on earth.
2. We live and then die
3. The more we learn, the less we know.

The human story since has been one long attempt to deny one or the other or all of them, usually by confusing truth with reality. Anyone of us can create any reality, indeed, we all make our own to some extent, but it's not truth. I agree comletely with your distrust of academic papers. I've never read one that begins with any understanding of what we are.