Humans are not more evolved than other animals
Chapter 12 endnote 53, from How Emotions are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain by Lisa Feldman Barrett.
Some context is:
Our challenge is to understand animal minds for their own sake, not as inferior human minds. The latter idea comes from the classical view of human nature, which implies that chimps and other primates are less evolved, diminished versions of ourselves.. [...] The classical view encourages this conceit, fueled by the “triune brain” myth of a simple brain evolving into something more complex.
The language of "higher" and "lower" processes, animals, brain systems, all imply an orderly evolution from simple to complex that scientists know to be false. The triune brain myth encourages us to be very impressed with ourselves: “Oh, those animals might come close to our perceptual and emotional abilities, but we sure have them beat in the cognition department.” This sentiment is, ironically, antithetical to natural selection, though it's consistent with Darwin’s original ideas. Darwin did not use the word "evolution" in On the Origin of Species, as the word “evolved” meant something other than it means today. He believed that evolution proceeded from a simple beginning to a complex, desired conclusion.