Rationality, learning and complexity: from the Homo economicus to the Homo sapiens.

Standard economics is based on methodological individualism but this does not imply that the individuals play a crucial role in its models. On the contrary, in such a theory the individual is deprived of authentic subjective characteristics and plays no sizeable role as genuine subject. The so called Homo economicus is just a signpost for given preferences that, however, are generally conceived as exogenous and invariant through time. Therefore, the genuine psychological features of the economic agent do not matter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]