Humans also didn't show any ambition, besides keeping themselves and their little band alive, for hundreds of thousands of years. We know they had the mental ca

Humans also didn't show any ambition, besides keeping themselves and their little band alive, for hundreds of thousands of years. We know they had the mental capacity because hunting, foraging, cooking and tool-making needs knowledge and planning, but they were fine as they were. Somehow humans started cooperating in large groups, planting the seeds of civilization, outcompeting (or possibly exterminating) our less social brethren. We can't know if the first human capable of leading large groups was a genius or a psychopath, but without people like him/her humanity probably wouldn't be very ambitious.