Top Human Flashcards

Human beings, Homo sapiens, are one of the strangest animals to be found on Earth. In some ways, we’re not so different from other apes – we have the same grasping hands, forward-facing eyes, and complex societies that have defined our branch in the tree of life.

In other ways, though, we are quite unique and unlike other animals. For one thing, we walk on two legs at all times, a trick that very few animals (and no other primates) have ever mastered. For another, we may live for many years after we are no longer capable of producing children – a process that human women take in stride, but that very few other animals ever undergo.

But what really sets us apart, the one thing that makes us completely unlike any other animal on Earth, is our language and the large, complex brain that produces it. Through language, we can develop technologies and share them with our friends and relatives. We can learn to live together in huge cooperative communities called cities – or we can destroy each other through war and pollution. We can create art, explore the stars, and learn about the world through science.
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