But consider the development of consciousness within the context of nature as a whole. Can you really see any overall progress or general trend? Eighty per cent of all multicellular organisms have been far more successful in evolutionary terms than mankind, without ever being part of this supposed trend towards neural complexity. The fact that we’re endowed with intelligence and consciousness is only evidence of progress from our particular viewpoint. We’re just some bizarre evolutionary sideshow that’s arisen against all the odds. There’s only one thing that the human species has contributed
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