"... Shall I tell you about Love?"
"Must you?"
"Yes. The human race - although what I say is applicable to virtually all mammals - the human race has achieved so much more than any other species in the time it's been this on earth - a couple of a million years, which is no time at all; about as long as it takes a sulphur dwarf to learn to walk - that the imagination is unable to cope with all these things that the human being has done. The human races created Things. They built wonderful buildings, invented wonderful machines, brought into being poetry, music, and art. To beguile their eighty-odd years they have every conceivable diversion, from the symphonies of Beethoven to the Rubik's Cube. They can rush round in sports cars, they can shoot elephants, they can travel around the world in days, or even hours. In virtually every respect, they have made themselves the equals of the Gods. Most of all, they have all the Things of the World at to use and entertain themselves with. And what do they like doing best of all? They like taking off their clothes - clothes over which they have expended so much effort and ingenuity- and doing biologically necessary but profoundly undignified things to other human beings. Any pig or spider can do that, it's the easiest thing in the world. But you bloody humans, who can do so much more than any species could ever do, you can't do that efficiently. You agonize over it. You make an incredible fuss over it. You get it all wrong, you make each other's lives miserable, you write dreary letters and take overdoses. You even invent a medicine that deliberately makes the whole process futile. My god, what a species!"

from Expecting Someone Taller by Tom Holt