Who are we? That is the big question. And essentially we are just an upright-walking, big-brained, super-intelligent ape.

What is it that really makes us, us? It's our collective intelligence. It's our ability to write things down, our language and our consciousness.

I think when you work on fossils, and you realize that a species is there, and it's abundant for quite a long period of time, and then at some point it's no longer there - and so, when you look at that bigger picture, yes, you realize that either you change and adapt, or, as a species, you go extinct.

My father so appropriately put it that we are certainly the only animal that makes conscious choices that are bad for our survival as a species.

Its important to remember that we evolved. Now, I know thats a dirty word for some people, but we evolved from common ancestors with the gorillas, the chimpanzee and also the bonobos. We have a common past, and we have a common future.