How come human kind is the only species to have developed sentience as a natural advantage? The neadratals had a better body to survive before they have completely sentinized. But they died out and we survived…
This is my WAG, but I think that the finishing touches on human sentience was provided by sexual selection. Females tended to select males that had the most power and were the leaders of the social group, and those tended to be the most intelligent. Repeat that for thousands of generations and you’re going to have sentience.
Well, science as we normally think of it is a very later addition to teh human repertoire of skills. In fact, it has hardly been around long enough to speak of as an evolutionary trait. Reason, now, in one form or another probably goes back several million years and was evidenced by many of our hominid ancestors, including neanderthals, homo erectus, and homo habilus. Unless someone would care to argue that the manufacture and use of second-generation tools (ie, tools used to shape other tools) can be accounted for without the capacity to reason.