Although this is not a religious topic, i will try to use some stuff here to prove that humans arent really anything special, and that a soal is not necessary for our level of intelligence.

The question? Which attributes of those old "monkeys" allowed us to evolve into what we are today.

Opposable thumbs and a tool-making brains surely helped.

Where did human emotions and highly evolved speech come from? We were so smart that survival was not a day to day struggle, so we had to fill our time with something.....maybe. Why do you think we enjoy TV and boxing matches so much? Maybe, we go to war with eachother because we have no other animals to fend off.

Truely humanity is just ONE BIG pack.