Most other species' notion of value is bounded by hunger. A roaming pack of wolves has an upper-bound of value they need to secure. Once their bellies are full, they are done.
Even though much of human behavior could be ultimately linked to hunger and survival, we have secondary, tertiary, and quaternary needs. Even something simple such as food, clothing, and shelter is an order-of-magnitude more complex than other animals' need for just food. For example, shelter requires territory which leads to war.
Roots of unbounded value
The unbounded nature of human value may come from high-risk, high-reward mating. (This is the classic Red Queen Hypothesis.)
Our niche may be too crowded. i.e. "My tribe needs to acquire better resources so that we aren't killed by another tribe."
We may be a "weak" species, where we can't survive without creative value-extraction. Other species just go into nature to exploit their one thing. As generalists, we need to roam hundreds of miles to get one thing here and then another thing over there. Our digestion is weak, and our skin is uncovered. The better we are at cooking, the weaker our digestive systems. The better we get at clothing ourselves, the less hair we need. But to cook and to clothe ourselves, we must transform nature in ways other species don't.
Path to ship-building
Start with foraging. If a niche is crowded, the specialist squirrel just dies and becomes more specialized in future generations. Humans die too, but we have the choice to stop foraging and build spears for hunting. But then hunting requires more territory, which pushes other hunters to be better value-extractors. i.e. "You took my niche, now I have to build a ship." Other species just die, because they have no other choice. But we have a choice due to our generalist nature.
