nger still is t  forabout a million years tools, yet tralopitook advantage of tec hem.

    At one point bet appears types coexisting in Africa. Only one, ed to last: s beginning about teionsralopit ted for sometralopit andgracile alike, vaniseriously, and possibly abruptly, over a million years ago. No oneknot Ridley, “e them.”

    Conventionally, ture about erally “man tween, and depending on wer, us, and ecessor.

    o use tools, albeit very simple ones. It ive creature, muc its brain  50 percentlarger t of Lucy in gross terms and not mucionally, so it ein of its day. No persuasive reason o groime it  big brainsand uprigly related—t t out of ts necessitatedcunning nerategies t fed off of or promoted braininess—so it er ted discoveries of so many bipedal dullards, to realize t t connection bet all.

    “to explain attersall.  of t devour 20 percent of its energy. tively picky in , your brain  complainbecause it  toucuff. It s glucose instead, and lots of it, even if it means s-ces: “tant danger of beingdepleted by a greedy brain, but cannot afford to let t o death.” A big brain needs more food and more food means increased risk.

    tattersall tionary accident. ep if you replayed tape of life—even if you ran it backonly a relatively s o te unlikely” tmodern hem would be here now.

    “One of t ideas for o accept,”   tion of anytable about our being  is part of ourvanity as  end to tion as a process t, in effect, o produce us. Even ants tended to t up until