Humanimal: How Homo sapiens Became Nature’s Most Paradoxical Creature―A New Evolutionary History

“Rutherford describes Humanimal as being about the paradox of how our evolutionary journey turned ‘an otherwise average ape’ into one capable of creating complex tools, art, music, science, and engineering. It’s an intriguing question, one his book sets against descriptions of the infinitely amusing strategies and antics of a dizzying array of animals.”—The New York Times Book Review

Publisher’s note: Humanimal was published in the UK under the title The Book of Humans.

Evolutionary theory has long established that humans are animals: Modern Homo sapiens are primates who share an ancestor with monkeys and other great apes. Our genome is 98 percent identical to a chimpanzee’s. And yet we think of ourselves as exceptional. Are we?

In this original and entertaining tour of life on Earth, Adam Rutherford explores the profound paradox of the “human animal.” Looking for answers across the animal kingdom, he finds that many things once considered exclusively human are not: In Australia, raptors have been observed starting fires to scatter prey; in Zambia, a chimp named Julie even started a “fashion” of wearing grass in one ear. We aren’t the only species that communicates, makes tools, or has sex for reasons other than procreation. But we have developed a culture far more complex than any other we’ve observed. Why has that happened, and what does it say about us?

Humanimal is a new evolutionary history—a synthesis of the latest research on genetics, sex, migration, and much more. It reveals what unequivocally makes us animals—and also why we are truly extraordinary.

• A Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived: The Human Story Retold Through Our Genes
• Genesis: The Deep Origin of Societies
• The Human Swarm: How Our Societies Arise, Thrive, and Fall
• A Brief History of Everyone Who Ever Lived: The Human Story Retold Through Our Genes
• Creation: How Science Is Reinventing Life Itself
• Mama's Last Hug: Animal Emotions and What They Tell Us about Ourselves
• Becoming Human: A Theory of Ontogeny
• Blueprint: The Evolutionary Origins of a Good Society
• The Goodness Paradox: The Strange Relationship Between Virtue and Violence in Human Evolution
• Origins: How Earth's History Shaped Human History