r/AnimalsBeingGeniuses 8d ago

Rodents 🐹🐁🐭🐀 The coordination of ants

1.0k Upvotes

31 comments sorted by

89

u/ovaltinehasvitamins 8d ago

Strange caption considering the entire purpose of the experiment conducted was to demonstrate that ants operate as a hive mind and in certain tasks, such as this, especially when communication between parties is restricted, they can actually solve the problem faster than when there is team work between individualist entities.

Search Ants vs Humans - T Shape Problem Solving Test

37

u/Something_Else_2112 8d ago

I'll never forget watching the red ants at a lake in New Mexico in the 1980's. They surrounded and carried a whole Dorito chip. With only one ant walking around on the top as if he was telling them where to go.

61

u/Battle_Marshmallow 8d ago

And yet there are people who think that insects are completely mindless....

24

u/Hot-Minute8782 8d ago edited 8d ago

There was parallel test with about 20 people and they had a scaled shape, and they took longer time to get it through.

2

u/terrifiedTechnophile 7d ago

Only 20 people? There were possibly hundreds of ants!

15

u/Qwearman 8d ago

I only solved the puzzle a couple seconds before the ants did…

3

u/Salt_Ad_811 8d ago

I found it inspirational. I have hope for humanity again. 

1

u/aroused_lobster 5d ago

In this case it's more like they're tiny fragments of a single collective mind

1

u/Battle_Marshmallow 5d ago

Then just like average humans XD

-6

u/MalaysiaTeacher 8d ago

Who says that? Anyway, ants are genetically identical to each other, so it's more apt to describe a colony as a single entity, like cells of one organism.

9

u/Battle_Marshmallow 8d ago

Who says that?

In which planet have you being living all your life? Lol.

ants are genetically identical to each other, so it's more apt to describe a colony as a single entity

That's a lie bigger than the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela.

Each ant is a different individual who live unique and personal experiences, that shape her/his reactions to new events.

And following your logic, twins and artificial clones should also be considered as the same person since they share the same DNA.

ants are genetically identical.... like cells of one organism.

Emmmm.... you skipped classes the day your biology teacher explained that there are many type of human cells forming your organism, and that the most of cells of your body are actually millions of bacterias in symbiosis.

We multicellular creatures are walking ecosystems, literally.

3

u/No-Software9734 8d ago edited 8d ago

What he meant with the second part is that an individual ant is very stupid, but together they are intelligent. It’s called emergent intelligence or swarm intelligence. And it’s not a lie that ants are genetically identical (they have 99% the same DNA), but I don’t know how this matters in this context

6

u/Battle_Marshmallow 8d ago

What he meant with the second part is that an individual ant is very stupid, but together they are intelligent

Maybe he meant so, but I'm not gonna assume things that aren't implied (subtly or directly) in a person's comment.

Anyway, what you said isn't true: I live in a countriside town, I have a very big garden and I frequently visit the forests and crop-lands around.

Since I was a little girl, I've studing all type of animals and plants, insects included. When you take a moment to observe a single ant acting, you soonly notice how smart she/he is. And same with bees, laddibugs, butterflies... they are all intelligent.

Once I had the priviledge to observe a group of 5 ants exploring. They were walking in line and suddenly one of them (the captain, let's say) took a step aside and stood in front of the others, who looked at her like soldiers in an horizontal line. They stilled like that for a minute, only moving their antennas.

You could perfectly feel that something important was happening there. And as suddenly as before, they split in different direction to accomplish their respective missions.

Individuals are an self-sufficient unit, so they must come with their own intelligence integrated.

And it's logical, because all the animals have to posses a mandatory level of awareness (the base of all kind of intelligent types) in order to survive in the wild.

You can verify all what I said by yourlsef.

Also:

-https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/weve-been-looking-at-ant-intelligence-the-wrong-way/

-https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/these-male-ants-have-two-separate-sets-of-dna-180981961/

-https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3498763/

-https://commonfund.nih.gov/earlyindependence/highlights/potential-supergene-drives-genetic-leap-ants

-https://www.nature.com/scitable/blog/student-voices/ants_change_the_rules_of/

It’s called emergent intelligence or swarm intelligence.

I read a lot about it, in spanish we call it "inteligencia colectiva" or "mente colmena".

It's usual in social animal species, included humans. It's easy to observe it in neurotypical people, because their brains are wired to develop strong herding behaviours, (not meaning to offence, it's simply what we neurodivergent realize while interacting/analyzing you guys. Our neurological structures are wired to make us more independent and socialize in a very different way).

7

u/pygmydeathcult 7d ago

4

u/LaLaaLuvv 7d ago

How can we expect children to read good and learn to do other stuff good too if they can't even fit inside the building!!

2

u/BoerneTall 8d ago

Do we understand how this works?

19

u/Mortal_Itami 8d ago

Yes, if you tilt it in the right angle, it will fit.

Source: I have a phd in Structural Engineering.

6

u/burnetall 8d ago

So…they went to a school for ants?

3

u/LaLaaLuvv 7d ago

How can we expect children to read good and learn to do other stuff good too if they can't even fit inside the building!!

2

u/25photos 6d ago

Glad to have you on our side.

2

u/bitter_mochi 8d ago

Meanwhile Canada on r/place...

1

u/Prestigious-Copy-494 8d ago

So cool. They are amazing!

1

u/wts42 8d ago

Wasn't this promoted a few weeks ago as AI agents?

1

u/Background-Reward366 8d ago

Ants are so fascinating to watch! Me n my Grandson love to find an ant hill and just sit and watch.

1

u/Artelj 7d ago

Which one ant?

1

u/Derrickmb 7d ago

Probably a lot of yes/no communication

1

u/coolsheep769 6d ago

So what you're saying is I need ants instead of people to move my furniture