It's possible for an animal to domesticate itself. This is one of the theories for how wolves were domesticated. It's not that humans did anything special to domesticate them but that wolves started hanging around humans and eating the scraps that were left over at campfires and other human habitation sites. Eventually the less fearful and tame wolves became human companions. Once people realized they could hang out with wolves they started actively breeding more tamer variants.
The same is true for humans. The process is obviously slightly more complicated because unlike wolves people have more influence on their environment but it's undeniable that humans are now domestic animals. No modern human can survive in the wilderness and this process is accelerating. We are now, for all intents and purposes, dependent on mechanical tools and technology for our continued existence. Feeding 8B people is impossible without industrial farming and agricultural techniques, e.g. Haber-Bosch. [1]
I did some research into this a couple years ago. There is an interesting theory that we didn't domesticate wolves, but that wolves domesticated us. For one, wolves naturally are very intelligent and pack hunters, so they could have used humans as a hunting partner. For another point, we domesticated wolves way before anything else (atleast 20000 years ago) and that makes no sense since every other animal we domesticated (goat, horse, chicken, etc) will eat pretty much anything and is only of very limited threat to us, whereas wolves are carnivores (very expensive to maintain) and extremely dangerous.
However, if wolves domesticated us as hunting partners, then this starts to make a lot more sense. We didn't need to first learn domestication on easier species, the danger was limited and our hunting would be so much more effective that it was worth the premium.
It also explains why we have the concept of werewolf and why some people have been charged with turning into wolves to be successful in hunting, but never any other animal (there are no cases of ware eagles/falcons). There is something primeval deep inside us that associates wolves with successful hunters.
I find the theory neat, I am not convinced it is true.
Ya, I also don't know if it's true or not. I was just making the point that an animal can domesticate itself by changing its environment and then adapting to the new environment in a way that ends up being essentially a self imposed domestication process.
By society. More intelligence means more likelihood of "waking up". It takes a little bit of ignorance and blind trust to be a cooperative member of society. Once you get too smart, you no longer become useful and then you have to start hunting on your own. Not everyone can do that in today's age, so most people choose to delegate their decisions because the reward is that you get to live without having to think as much.
The same is true for humans. The process is obviously slightly more complicated because unlike wolves people have more influence on their environment but it's undeniable that humans are now domestic animals. No modern human can survive in the wilderness and this process is accelerating. We are now, for all intents and purposes, dependent on mechanical tools and technology for our continued existence. Feeding 8B people is impossible without industrial farming and agricultural techniques, e.g. Haber-Bosch. [1]
1: https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/haber-bosch...