We have two contradictory expectations about human biology and behaviour. Given our primate and mammalian ancestry, we must be pretty similar to chimps, monkeys, and even rats. But given our big brains, superior intelligence, language, and above all, our ability to make culture and abide by it, we must be quite different. As is often the case, the truth is probably somewhere in between. But that’s not good enough for anthropologists and evolutionary biologists. We want to know for sure and also exactly where in between.
‘A spectacularly detailed study’
Our task is mind-bogglingly complex, given the staggering variation among the 500 primate and 6,500 mammal species and the equally daunting variability among the thousands of human tribes and cultures. To make any headway, we must pick one biological or behavioural trait at a time and study it in large numbers of mammalian species and many human cultures. This is by no means a job for a single scientist.
