====== The Cultural Animal ======

When compared to other animals, humans are in a category of animal that happens to have only one member: us. Many animals are solitary, coming together only for mating. Quite a few kinds of animals are social, living in groups, with some degree of coordination and cooperation, and often having social structures such as a dominance hierarchy. Human collective behavior is indeed social, but we are //cultural// animals, and differ from other social animals in ways that are quite important to us. In particular, we have a unique reliance on cumulative culture mediated by language. We also show uniquely high levels of cooperation between unrelated individuals. See the book [[books:cultural_animal_book]].


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