Scientists believe that the first anatomically modern humans, Homo Sapiens appear in Africa around 300,000 years ago. They start to migrate out of Africa as early as 270,000 years ago but these waves appear to have been unsuccessful and either died out or pulled back. It was the group that left 70,000 years ago that eventually succeeds in reaching all the habitable places of the world and interbreeding with archaic humans such as Neanderthals and Denisovans along the way. 

The periods of scarcity and deprivation during the ice age 115,000 years ago would have wiped us out; the great drought between 90,000 and 70,000 years did reduce our numbers to just 17,000 individuals; the mini ice age 33,000 - 20,000 years ago, when 25% of the earth’s surface was covered in ice should have definitely finished the last of us. But we survive hardship after hardship while our cousin ape species go extinct. 

The reason we survived while our cousins perished - why a small band of apes pulls through one climate catastrophe after another is because we had each other and each other's back. And without this unique ability for love and compassion, we too would have been just another failed attempt at migration and cognition.

Neurology and archaeology both point towards a time in our deep past when being able to love and be compassionate were winning evolutionary attributes. We find evidence of this unique ability and the advantage this offered our ancestors written in our bodies and minds. We catch glimpses of this in ancient cave paintings and ancient toys and artifacts.