are festive rituals expressions of authority, or vehicles for social creativity? Are they reactionary or progressive? Were our earliest ancestors simple and egalitarian, or complex and stratified? Is human nature innocent or corrupt? Are we, as a species, inherently co-operative or competitive, kind or selfish, good or evil? Perhaps all these questions blind us to what really makes us human in the first place, which is our capacity – as moral and social beings – to negotiate between such alternatives.
