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  1. Vermiform

    How insect 'civilisations' recast our place in the Universe

    Humanity is slowly going the way of a "hive mind" through the internet but not in the way of control or manipulation but rather the collection of all information and opinions into a single "mind" which can be influenced by all but truly changed by no individual alone. An idea can spread through the net until it becomes a fact to our species no matter if it truly is that, until it is tested en mass and is corrected. Basically the same model of ants during foraging.
  2. Vermiform

    How insect 'civilisations' recast our place in the Universe

    The type of Hive Mind we've been shown in most if not all fiction has nothing to do with how real life eusociality works or ever will. Every example of a true superorganism acts in a way that is both centralised and decentralised, there is no "mind" or queen behind the actions of the hive or colony. Every decision is made independently but judged and executed by the whole group. Every single member of the hive can be the mind but never the only mind. It's both funny and sad that we have actually streamlined and simplified the concept of collective intelligence while thinking we've made it more outlandish.
  3. Vermiform

    How insect 'civilisations' recast our place in the Universe

    Termites have certain things going for em too! Thing is it was never an issue of "winning" only losing. Insects are not a singular force "out to get us", they're just the group of animals that best found how to use, abuse and coexist with the environment. Nature is about balance not dominance, if a single species begins to grow out of control it eventually meets its demise by messing with this fragile balance. Insects are not some chosen dominant force but their body structure, organisation and capabilities are, so even if it was not today's bugs that came to become this force it would have been another group that'll resemble them. Humanity has 2 options of directing their own place within the universe, one is cybernetic and the other genetic. Both will lead to our species' extinction not by annihilation but simply abandoning of the human species. Dealing with cybernetics is less dangerous but also less potent and efficient. Dealing with genetic tinkering is vastly more...
  4. Vermiform

    How insect 'civilisations' recast our place in the Universe

    When looking to other creatures for signs of intelligence, insects are rarely the most obvious candidates, but as the historian Thomas Moynihan writes, it wasn't always so. What can the early-20th Century fascination with bug societies tell us about our own? It is 1919, and a young astronomer...
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