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 Posted: Sun Jul 17, 2005 12:59 am
It's the middle of summer, the ants are in full force scavenging every square centimeter of this earth for food... and so my house is also invaded by this micro-army. I watched one for a little while earlier today and it made me wonder "What the heck is that ant thinking?" And how developed is the ant's mind?
An ant obviously makes decisions, as I watch it move around and stop every few inches and contemplate for a moment which direction she will go. Then she made her way across the floor and started climbing my leg. I brushed her off and had a good laugh at her stupidity... I spotted her again a few feet away wandering around... and she again makes her way over to me and starts climbing my leg. What the heck?? I mean, my name IS "Tree" but I'm not REALLY a tree. My best guess is that it thought it was exploring new territory.
And have you ever seen two ants going opposite directions meet? Often times they'll stop for just a second and I swear it looks like they're talking. I imagine their conversation as "Find anything good?" "Na, just a few crumbs... but nothing to get to excited about."
And ants definitely know when they're in danger. When I was a little kid, I got my first magnifying glass.... and of course, the best use I could think of it for was burning things with sunlight.... which eventually leads to slaughtering several squads of ants patrolling the sidewalk. If you saw an ant moving slowly and you didn't get the focus of the sun quite right the ant feel that heat and take off running. And as I chased him, he seemed to dodge every move I would make...
Not to mention the many summers spent destroying ant hills with firecrackers, whistling jacks and other fireworks. The ants would evacuate...and as they evacuated they would look for ANY living creature that could be responsible and attacked them. Whether they were responsible for lighting the fireworks or not. They can definitely sense when their home is in danger.
There's also the two great animated interpretations... AntZ and A Bugs Life. Although, I liked AntZ much more. I think it had a lot more philosphy built into it.
After all, each of is just a tiny speck on the planet compared to the 5+ billion people on the planet... we're just as insignificant.
Lastly... there's an older game called SimANT on Super Nintendo and PC that gives some great perspective, as well. You spend the entire game either searching for food, digging tunnels (which is addicting as hell), avoiding being killed by humans and spiders... and having wars with nearby anthills. Great game.. practically free now.
Okay, now that I'm done with my rant. What's your take on it?
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Posted: Sun Jul 17, 2005 4:52 am
ochimaru And how developed is the ant's mind? Without a head, the ant can live until it starves; the brain serves very little function. It can do this because the ant has mini-processers in each of its legs, receiving signals from other parts of the nervous system and responding. Quote: An ant obviously makes decisions, as I watch it move around and stop every few inches and contemplate for a moment which direction she will go. This is true. They're probably assessing the lighting and smells of the area, and deciding which place is most likely to have food. Quote: Then she made her way across the floor and started climbing my leg. I brushed her off and had a good laugh at her stupidity... I spotted her again a few feet away wandering around... and she again makes her way over to me and starts climbing my leg. What the heck?? I mean, my name IS "Tree" but I'm not REALLY a tree. Ants aren't known for their learning capability. It might not have made the connection that [crawling on leg] --> [getting brushed off]. Quote: And have you ever seen two ants going opposite directions meet? Often times they'll stop for just a second and I swear it looks like they're talking. I imagine their conversation as "Find anything good?" "Na, just a few crumbs... but nothing to get to excited about." This is an interesting part of the ant's behaviour. Ants exchange pheremones (and sometimes half-digested food) when they run into each other. They tell each other what they have found, whether it be food, danger, or in some rare cases, a suitable place to move the colony. The other ant can then follow the pheremone trail to the location which they heard of. Quote: They can definitely sense when their home is in danger. Ants emit a huge quantity of the danger pheremone at the first sign of pain. Every ant in the area immediately knows that they have to make a break for it. Quote: There's also the two great animated interpretations... AntZ and A Bugs Life. Those movies anthromorphized ants so much that they weren't even ants anymore, really. Quote: Lastly... there's an older game called SimANT on Super Nintendo and PC that gives some great perspective, as well. You spend the entire game either searching for food, digging tunnels (which is addicting as hell), avoiding being killed by humans and spiders... and having wars with nearby anthills. Great game.. practically free now. I have so many great memories of that game. I loved how that stupid human that lived in the house would walk around the yard, occasionally stepping on ants. Man, he was as big a hazard as the damned spider. ===================================================== But, here's my take on ants; an ant colony is basically a giant brain; each individual ant receives some messages via the senses, and communicates it to the other ants via pheremones. The entire colony then has all of the important information which each ant knows. Ants also exhibit strangely human-like behaviour; much of it because of basic instinct, but also because of their connectedness.
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Posted: Sun Jul 17, 2005 9:03 am
I can't help but be reminded of a humourous incident that happened...
My sister had been eating buttered tortillas. Anyway, before she could wash her hands, she found a little ant on the counter and squished it.
A little while later, Mom finds what she thought was a dirty spot, but it was actually a bunch of ants that gathered around the spot with the squished ant, which had butter smeared around it.
Ever since then, she has been dubbed the butter god, and the ants send a sacrifice to recieve this treat from the... um, something above. xd
On another note, ants are indeed somewhat interesting. It's also interesting watching as a frog will sit there, then start to hop away. Sure, he may be afraid of something bigger, but I can't help but think that it is also thinking "pick on someone your own size! Leave me alone!" *hop hop*.
Back to the ants, I sort of got tired, and did what I do when my computer acts up. I tried just saying that they could stay as long as they didn't eat anything on the counters and such, and didn't swarm.
Well... coincidence, but I only see one every once in awhile, and they only swarmed around something on the floor. xd ( 3nodding Yet, in no way could I actually prove they were listening, or understood.)
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Posted: Sun Jul 17, 2005 5:39 pm
Did anyone play "ant wars" when they were younger? Or maybe you could call it "ant gladiators?" Maybe I was just a sadistic kid, but I loved to catch ants from different ant hills... count them out in even numbers and then throw them in a jar together and watch the battle rage on. Something with ants... as soon as they see an ant from another ant hill they go into a battle rage. ha ha... And if you throw in a 3rd enemy... like a spider or other large insect... the ants will band together to destroy the enemy and then continue their pointless battle against one another. That's what I did before computers, video games and cable television...
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Posted: Mon Jul 18, 2005 4:56 am
This is a good question. However, I have serious doubts concerning ants having philosophical brain waves. xd
Their behavior is probably due to instinct and, as was so accurately put, the function as a giant brain rather than a hundred little pointless ones.
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Posted: Mon Jul 18, 2005 2:24 pm
So, you don't think it is possible for even the colony mentality as a whole to have philosophical thoughts? I suppose not. They say that ants are very similar to analog robots. Yet their colony mentality is truly beyond our understanding, I think. After all, where does the original thoughts come from for ants? Does the queen give them out?
Mankind ALSO has a colony mentality... in that we all learn from each other and new ideas travel very fast... especially in this day and age. Someone could come up with an earth-shattering idea, and if they posted it on the net, it could be spread around the world in less than an hour. Hell, if you consider that Japan is actually a day ahead of us, the new idea would actually spread into the future. ^_^ Isn't it possible ants could experience a similar thing?
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Posted: Fri Sep 02, 2005 8:37 pm
[ Message temporarily off-line ]
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Posted: Fri Sep 02, 2005 9:31 pm
I observed and interesting thing from a single ant while I was sitting reading out on the bridge that connects my campus across a lake. the ant was walking in circles around one side of me, and disapeared beneath my knee at one point, then reappeared, again circling. Out of curiosity, I got up, moved back a few feet, then sat back down. The ant walked right across where I had been sitting and disapeared over the edge of the bridge. I didn't see him the rest of the time I was out there. Apparently I was just sitting on his scent trail and couldn't figure out where he was supposed to go. Similar to in A Bug's Life, when a leaf falls on their path, and they panic? I don't know. I thought it was interesting.
And like people said, ants have more of a hive mentality, but I think their basis is still focused almost entirely onto survival rather than any form of enlightenment.
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Posted: Sat Sep 03, 2005 10:19 pm
squish the ant swarms and watch them freak out
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Posted: Sun Sep 04, 2005 10:13 pm
Hmm... I didn't respond to this topic earlier because my response is quite simple.
Who am I (or any of us) to presume what the ant thinks? We can't presume what it thinks anymore than I can presume what you're thinking right now. Well, you can presume, but you sure as heck won't be right in all liklihood. Call this dodging the discussion bullet if you want, but that's how I feel about this topic. whee
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Posted: Mon Sep 05, 2005 8:21 pm
all i know is that they don't like being stepped on, but then most things don't unless they can't feel the pressure
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Posted: Fri Apr 07, 2006 6:37 am
Ants are too basic a life-form. They cannot really think, so much as simply react to stimulus.
Philosophy is solely attainable by the most advanced intellects on earth. Those of humans.
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Posted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 9:28 pm
Well...
I had told the story of "the butter god" already. Something recent though...
This family, on some occasions, will buy doughnuts. Just... really good.
So, I noticed a box that was on the microwave, as usual. I was wondering if there were any more left...
Lo and behold, ants too discovered there were doughnuts! scream
Picking up the box... the events were that my sister tried to grab the box, and it dropped. So, picking it up, the ants were running around, forgetting about the doughnuts it seems.
Taking them out, the doughnuts were all bagged and tossed into the fridge, where they should have been regardless.
I then took the box out, still with ants, and hosed it down into a soggy mess because, hey, I knew I couldn't just throw the box away. Who knows what would happen if the ants found that there was more food in the trash?
Ants not thinking or not... I wouldn't know. I just know I don't want to find any jimmies (which... that's I guess another name for sprinkles sweatdrop ) in my doughnuts.
Or Dans for that matter. xd
(Yes, it's a joke. I said I hoped there weren't ants in the doughnuts... and then I made a comment "Hey, there are black jimmies in here... and a Dan! 3nodding " "A Dan? sad " "Yeah... I'm just joking. sweatdrop ")
(Ok... so I do make bad jokes. sweatdrop )
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Posted: Sat Jul 29, 2006 12:25 pm
i always thought that ants had a hive mind, each ant would be an extention of the mind, like thousands of nerve endings on a person.
different ants seem to have different jobs, some seem to scout, when they are far away from their hill or trail, but still seem to wonder around looking for something. others help build or maintain the ant hill, and some just gather food.
it would seem like they are much to orginized to just be a bunch of electrical instincts. and i liked Antz more than a bugs life. mrgreen
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Posted: Wed Aug 16, 2006 1:05 pm
Invictus_88 Ants are too basic a life-form. They cannot really think, so much as simply react to stimulus.
Philosophy is solely attainable by the most advanced intellects on earth. Those of humans. What an elitest answer! I suppose us 'advanced intellects' also own the planet, too? lol. That's for a whole 'nother topic (to be created after this post). Many of you answered with the 'hive mentality' but what about hairy ants? At one time, I wanted to be an entemologist, and my favorite insect was the red haired ant. These are nomadic insects that little is known about, except that they live alone in hot arid climates. I once found one crossing the road by my house in the middle of summer... I captured it and kept it for a few days, but released it again for fear that I wasn't feeding it properly. Still my favorite insect, though. So much cooler than those OTHER ants. What about aunts? Are they philosophical? xd
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