If you want to design a successful human society you need to know what kind of animal we are. Are we a social animal or a selfish animal? Do we respond better when we're solitary or living in a group?

When we are bad, we are worse than any primate that I know. And when we are good, we are actually better and more altruistic than any primate that I know.

Empathy as a complex emotion is different. It requires awareness of the other person's feelings and of one's own reactions. The appropriate reaction may not be to cry when another person cries, but to reassure them, or even to leave them alone.

Although elephants are far more distantly related to us than the great apes, they seem to have evolved similar social and cognitive capacities.

Socialism cannot function, because its economic reward structure is contrary to human nature.

The possibility that empathy resides in parts of the brain so ancient that we share them with rats should give pause to anyone comparing politicians with those poor, underestimated creatures.

Exclusive homosexuality is not very common in nature.