First of all: there is NO difference between an ant stick, and a weapon. both go under the category "tools".

Second: You should start paying attention to animal planet and discovery. Haven't you heard that orangutans and chimps are able to learn sign language and communicate with humans?
As for self-awareness: when a chimp has it's own name, knows who is sitting in the mirror, and is acting basically like a child, what would you call that?

There is no difference between an ape and a human, just a bit of evolution. apes has the same social structures as humans, they play together, like other apes, hate other apes... the similarities are almost endless, but the differences are very hard to find.

Evolution is an obvious thing. you should start working on how to incorporate it into a system that is going WAY out of date...
Believe me, it won't take long before Christian thinkers have found a way to explain how evolution is made by God. It's not even hard to do, it's just that evolution proves christianity wrong. Not that they will even consider that to be an obstacle..