Life existed without human beings for more than 99.9% of Earth’s history. Yet we often ignore the achievements of species that preceded us by billions of years.
I explore the concept of nonhuman civilisations in my new book, Biocivilisations, which retells the story of life acknowledging the contributions of other species. Bacteria, plants, fungi, insects, birds, whales and other species demonstrate language, engineering, science, medicine, agriculture and more. These are all elements of civilisation that we associate with humans.
