Our closest living relatives — chimps, bonobos, gorillas, orang-utans, and gibbons — are extremely smart, but their particular form of intelligence is predicated on the fact that they can’t necessarily trust their neighbours.  Male chimps cooperate to hund for food or patrol their territory, but they also are obsessed with achieving social dominance within their group.  Female chimps also compete with one another to monopolise the best resources for themselves and their kin within the group.  A baby chimp can’t leave its mother to play with the other chimps; it might get beaten up or killed.

Modern human social life can get this dysfunctional.  Think of the arms races among superpowers, blood feuds in tribal societies, and bitter political disputes in which the only thing that matters is to beat one’s opponent.  The kind of reflection that Teilhard de Chardin had in mind comes to a screeching halt under these conditions…