[HN Gopher] The mystery of why one ant species goes after larger...
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The mystery of why one ant species goes after larger foes (2018)
Author : tosh
Score : 224 points
Date : 2020-10-04 12:06 UTC (10 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.nationalgeographic.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.nationalgeographic.com)
| sradman wrote:
| The paper _Prey specialization and chemical mimicry between
| Formica archboldi and Odontomachus ants_ [1]
|
| > Beyond providing natural history insights into the relationship
| between these species, this study expands our knowledge of an
| important insect chemical phenotype. The intraspecific
| variability in F. archboldi cuticular hydrocarbon profiles is
| among the greatest reported for social insects and provides a
| unique case of how non-parasitic species can generate parasite-
| like chemical-mimic phenotypes.
|
| Formica archboldi (headhunter) ants [2]:
|
| > ...are known for their abnormal behavior, which includes the
| collection and storage of Odontomachus (trap-jaw) ant skulls.
|
| [1] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00040-018-0675-y
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formica_archboldi
| fiftyacorn wrote:
| Like predator
| agumonkey wrote:
| crazy level of symbolicness ..
| sonicggg wrote:
| You could easily make a movie out of this.
| dudul wrote:
| Who doesn't?
| 082349872349872 wrote:
| Freeze heads, don't shrink them.
| [deleted]
| lifeisstillgood wrote:
| "What is best in life?"
|
| "To squish your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the
| lamentations of their queen"
| Yetanfou wrote:
| "What is the best in life?"
|
| "Hot water, good dentishtry and shoft lavatory paper".
| eternalban wrote:
| That is the stereotypical voice of the opium addict in some
| locales/cultures. Is it universal?
| Yetanfou wrote:
| Could be, but in this case it is because Cohen the
| Barbarian [1] lacks dentures.
|
| [1] https://wiki.lspace.org/mediawiki/Cohen_the_Barbarian
| 082349872349872 wrote:
| https://history.stackexchange.com/questions/23975/what-was-t...
| lifeisstillgood wrote:
| I was not going for anything as high brow as Gengis, just
| rewriting Arnie for the Ant generation :-)
| secondcoming wrote:
| "lamentations of the women"
| hsnewman wrote:
| There is so much science doesn't know, labeling it as decorating
| their homes is far fetched. There are 1000's of other reasons
| they could be doing this behavior that isn't anthropomorphism.
| dang wrote:
| Now that you mention it, you're right: the title is
| anthropomorphizing in a baity way. That means it should be
| changed (from https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html:
| "*Please use the original title, unless it is misleading or
| linkbait").
|
| I've changed it to use what appears to be representative
| language from the article body. If anyone can suggest a better
| title (i.e. more accurate and neutral, preferably using
| representative language from the article), we can change it
| again.
| max_ wrote:
| Reminds of the "epistemological" reasons Nassim Taleb hates
| history
| masterphilo wrote:
| One possible explanation mentioned in the article is that
| "they're using the dead bodies of their prey to mask themselves
| in the scent of their local prey species". Seems a lot more
| likely than a tactic to strike fear into the hearts of their
| enemies...
| chrisco255 wrote:
| It seems reasonable on the surface, but how long can these
| decaying heads maintain their scent? Unless they're
| constantly refreshing them with new ones, the scent would
| fade very quickly.
| mlang23 wrote:
| Well, the universe is unfair and doesnt give a damn about the
| concept of humanity. It feels like we are systematically
| forgetting about this fact. Dont get me wrong, I am happy that
| humans have amanged to establish at least a few rules of conduct
| which make it relatively nice to be amongst humans in certain
| countries. However, as said, we seem to forget that this is not
| the norm in the universe.
| secondcoming wrote:
| Indeed, none of us matters at all really.
| freedomben wrote:
| This kind of reminds me of a favorite sub-reddit: r/natureismetal
|
| Be prepared to lose 15 minutes of time to the reddit scroll
| vortex though :-D
| bryanrasmussen wrote:
| So have many human societies through the ages, the scythians were
| the first that came to mind.
| waynecochran wrote:
| Assyrians liked to pile heads ... very effective
| psychologically I felled 3,000 of their
| fighting men with the sword. I carried off prisoners,
| possessions, oxen, [and] cattle from them. I burnt many
| captives from them. I captured many troops alive: from some I
| cut off their arms [and] hands; from others I cut off their
| noses, ears, [and] extremities. I gouged out the eyes of many
| troops. I made one pile of the living (and) one of heads. I
| hung their heads on trees around the city, I burnt their
| adolescent boys [and] girls. I razed, destroyed, burnt, [and]
| consumed the city.
|
| -- Ashurnasirpal II
| hindsightbias wrote:
| Upon the capture of Jerusalem in the first crusade, they did
| not discriminate between Muslim and Jew:
|
| "But now that our men had possession of the walls and towers,
| wonderful sights were to be seen. Some of our men (and this
| was more merciful) cut off the heads of their enemies; others
| shot them with arrows, so that they fell from the towers;
| others tortured them longer by casting them into the flames.
| Piles of heads, hands, and feet were to be seen in the
| streets of the city. It was necessary to pick one's way over
| the bodies of men and horses. But these were small matters
| compared to what happened at the Temple of Solomon, a place
| where religious services are ordinarily chanted. What
| happened there? If I tell the truth, it will exceed your
| powers of belief. So let it suffice to say this much, at
| least, that in the Temple and porch of Solomon, men rode in
| blood up to their knees and bridle reins."
| 082349872349872 wrote:
| An (apocryphal!) recent Linear-A decrypt says: "Optimists
| learn egyptian. Pessimists learn assyrian. Realists learn
| horsemanship."
| bryanrasmussen wrote:
| now that the title has been changed from being about Ants
| decorating their nests with the heads of their enemies the
| above doesn't make much sense, and the edit window has changed.
|
| At any rate I don't think human societies go after enemies
| bigger than themselves, that is a thing for individual humans
| to do.
| christiansakai wrote:
| Brutal
| tomcam wrote:
| So do I
| LargoLasskhyfv wrote:
| Humans did too: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shrunken_head
| ulises314 wrote:
| Hey! just like my ancestors!
| totaldude87 wrote:
| archived link - for those who can't see the page -
| https://archive.is/N5drE
| sushshshsh wrote:
| To me, it is very saddening (but still it is reality) that
| organisms have been forced to evolve with a "kill or be killed"
| biological wiring.
|
| You'll see that on certain Galapagos islands, where no natural
| predators exist for the iguana, the iguana is completely docile
| to all other organisms around it. What's even cooler is that the
| iguana also only eats seaweed and algae, which means it does not
| need to kill other animals to survive. It has developed
| evolutionary adaptations to subsist on this diet as well, such as
| nasal glands that remove excess harmful salt from their bodies.
|
| I am a firm believer that all of the war and crime you see in the
| world is driven by some biological wiring that most of us
| continental organism possess, from ants to humans.
|
| If we had all evolved to be more like iguanas, I wonder if
| society would have made more (or less!) technological and
| societal progress, given that a lot of technological advancements
| come from the demands of war--
|
| but war is not a necessary condition for technological
| advancement now is it?
|
| Long live the Galapagos iguana!
| jostmey wrote:
| Maybe if we had evolved to be more like iguanas we wouldn't
| even have society at all. We would just sit on rocks, seeking
| to stay warm, never striving for more
| curation wrote:
| Since Global West "more" has delivered destruction of the
| biosphere, I'll also long for contemplative humanity not
| colonial.
| sushshshsh wrote:
| I think I also prefer the docile society of technological
| backwardness, sitting on rocks in the warm equatorial sun
| and eating algae, none the wiser to the possibilities
| sitting around me involving smelting and electricity :)
|
| But the comment above us is probably right, it would seem
| that the iguanas have been "doing nothing" for tens of
| thousands, if not hundreds of thousands or millions of
| years. Meanwhile humans have "accomplished a lot" in the
| past 10,000 years lets say, at the expense of many many
| many other things.
| cal5k wrote:
| Ah yes, the idea of the noble savage.
|
| Back when Zimbabwe was still Rhodesia, in addition to
| fighting the Mugabe-lead rebels the Rhodesian military had
| to routinely step in to stop rival tribes from slaughtering
| each other. The default state of humanity is tribal
| warfare, not some beautiful Eden-esque utopia.
| "Colonialism" wasn't the cause, this is just humanity.
|
| I don't know why people are so keen to deny this. Nature is
| brutal and yet still beautiful, and I don't see why
| humanity should consider itself to be special in that
| regard.
| Turing_Machine wrote:
| Note that pretty much all of the North American megafauna
| were wiped out within a few thousand years of the arrival
| of the proto-Native Americans.
|
| The only exceptions were species that were total badasses
| (bears, pumas), extremely prolific (deer), or a
| combination of badass and prolific (wolves, bison).
|
| Also note that the pre-Contact Aztecs weren't exactly
| nice people. I believe it was Neal Stephenson who
| observed that one measure of how much the Aztecs sucked
| was that when the Spanish Inquisition took over, things
| actually became more humane.
| sfink wrote:
| You may be right, but s/prolific/tasty/ mostly works as
| well.
|
| Species can survive humans if (1) the humans can't wipe
| them out (badass, prolific) or (2) humans don't want to
| wipe them out (tasty/useful, invisible, cute).
| vagrantJin wrote:
| Hahaha. Who stepped in to do what? I don't think you've
| thought this answer through mate. Anothet time mate.
| WD-42 wrote:
| Sorry, you can't compare warring factions in an already
| war torn and exploited country to the normal behavior of
| humanity.
| Turing_Machine wrote:
| Can you give us an example of a country that wasn't war
| torn and exploited at some point in its history?
| TheOtherHobbes wrote:
| If you go back far enough, you get this:
|
| https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/new-
| study-o...
| gearhart wrote:
| Talking about the normal behaviour of humanity is like
| talking about the normal outcome of addition. It depends
| entirely on the inputs.
| luckylion wrote:
| Who taught the first human tribe engaging in warfare the
| idea? Who taught chimps? Who taught all the other species
| that fight over resources?
| throw51319 wrote:
| Yup, a huge fallacy used to push an agenda of "how it
| really was!"
|
| Yes - the world was peaceful until the big bad West came
| into play. Very bad people!
|
| Lol. The reality is as you lay above. Constantly clashes
| for resources and land, just as the lives of wild animals
| are in the present.
|
| Even just watching the birds eating from a limitless
| supply of seeds this morning, they were fighting and
| establishing an order.
| danans wrote:
| > The default state of humanity is tribal warfare, not
| some beautiful Eden-esque utopia. "Colonialism" wasn't
| the cause, this is just humanity.
|
| Colonialism isn't the cause, but colonialism, powered by
| weapons and transportation technology and the concept of
| manifest destiny, massively increased the scope and scale
| of human exploitation of other humans.
| secondcoming wrote:
| This is an animated map of who owned what parts of Europe
| over the past 1000 years. Do you consider 'colonialism'
| to be different to any other form of human expansion done
| since time began?
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UY9P0QSxlnI
| [deleted]
| kubanczyk wrote:
| Iguanas are at the mercy of evolution. We aren't.
|
| Evolution is cruel beyond our comprehension and so it does
| not have mercy. Today they sit in the sun, their
| grandchildren can be cannibals eating each other. We have a
| say, for now.
| Hoasi wrote:
| > Iguanas are at the mercy of evolution. We aren't.
|
| Given enough time, every species evolves. Now, the twist is
| that the human species could alter its own.
| hirundo wrote:
| > Iguanas are at the mercy of evolution. We aren't.
|
| Not being at the mercy of evolution is an illusion caused
| by being at the mercy of both genetic and memetic
| evolution. If we do things that are at odds with either our
| biological and social adaptation, we tend to not replicate
| as much as otherwise.
|
| For instance we can chose not to eat or have sex, but that
| just edits our patterns out of the population as it always
| has. We can change society such that acts that were
| adaptive are now maladaptive, but that just changes
| evolutionary pressures rather than eliminating them. Even
| as we master evolution it still masters us.
|
| It's like the illusion in orbit that you have escaped
| gravity, but you're just falling continuously.
| kubanczyk wrote:
| I do care whether I'm subjected to cultural pressures or
| to genetic pressures and I would rather _not_ muddle my
| worldview by conflating them to a single category.
| Calling them collectively "evolution" is not a subtle
| mistake to make.
|
| In fact placing together memetics and genetics in a
| single sentence doesn't even compile for me. It's like
| stamp-collecting and murder. Yes, my whole point is that
| we are operating on memetic engine and it works wonders.
|
| I'll point out one thing "that just edits our patterns
| out of the population as it always has", just like not
| eating or not having sex: being infected by tuberculosis
| bacteria. By your reasoning developing a vaccine is just
| silly. Do we even want to rescue any Chopins or Orwells
| or Kafkas. Vaccine (which is effectively a meme) "just
| changes evolutionary pressures rather than eliminating
| them". If it happens, good, if it doesn't happen, no
| worries? That's the message?
|
| Iguanas surely don't give a fuck about their Chopins.
| Volundr wrote:
| > I do care whether I'm subjected to cultural pressures
| or to genetic pressures and I would rather not muddle my
| worldview by conflating them to a single category.
| Calling them collectively "evolution" is not a subtle
| mistake to make.
|
| But they absolutely are the same category. 100%, and
| always have been. Just look at how mating preference has
| affected many species, ex: the peacock. "Cultural"
| pressure preferred men with a colorful booty, and over
| time genetics conformed. The same is true if the
| "culture" prefers people who are soft spoken,
| adversarial, drawn to the color green, or have a funny
| left ear. If the culture means that people with a certain
| trait are more successful and thus more likely to
| reproduce over a sufficient period of time genetics will
| trend towards producing more individuals like that.
|
| As for the rest of your comment, I keep reading it over
| and over and I can't figure out what your getting at.
| Developing a vaccine means more people in my group are
| likely to survive to reproduce, thus (given sufficient
| time) evolution will favor those species that can produce
| vaccines (or not be vulnerable to the disease in the
| first place).
| praptak wrote:
| I don't see how this is bad. If I could rewire my reward
| center to keep me happy with not striving for more, I'd do
| that.
| sfink wrote:
| It's not bad, it's just that if you were able to do this
| then you would not reproduce and would remove your
| contribution to the genetics (and to a lesser degree,
| memetics) of future generations.
| Volundr wrote:
| That's not true though? Iguana's reproduce just fine.
| Being content with what one has does not preclude seeking
| out sex.
| drewbug wrote:
| Recreational drugs are widely available
| praptak wrote:
| They do not work that way.
| wasdfff wrote:
| Buddhism does, however.
| mamon wrote:
| Buddhism as a religion is basically anti-life. Wanting
| something, having goals and pursuing them - that's what
| every living creature does. Except for Buddhist, who
| often deliberately choose death as their way out of their
| miserable lives, see
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sokushinbutsu
|
| Or, to put it more bluntly: buddhism is a religion of
| losers trying to convince themselves that being a loser
| is OK.
| shard wrote:
| Depends on the drug, and the interpretation of "not
| striving for more":
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amotivational_syndrome
| sushshshsh wrote:
| Totally agree with this. The iguanas have evolved to be
| able to totally subsist with what is in front of them and
| not strive for more. Their Maslow checklist is 100%
| complete :)
| TheOtherHobbes wrote:
| Maybe on an evolutionary meta-level striving for more is the
| equivalent of sitting on rocks and trying to stay warm - and
| we're stuck in this hyperactive local minimum one step from
| collective suicide because we're not smart enough to work
| that out.
| bananamerica wrote:
| Well, good, evil and sad are human concepts that probably do
| not apply to the mental life of ants. We tend to ascribe deeper
| meaning to things, even when that is not reasonable.
| sushshshsh wrote:
| In some sects, I would imagine that sadness is seen as a bug
| and not a feature-- "why feel bad that you killed something
| to survive? you should be proud!" is a theme common in our
| human history.
| bananamerica wrote:
| I might say: "why are you sad due to nature working as it
| should?"
| joeberon wrote:
| Why is it saddening? Only to us as social intelligent animals.
| Stop projecting your clinging to your continued existence onto
| nature!
| ganzuul wrote:
| A billion years of instinct must lead to uncertainty and
| mixed feelings. We great apes are a strange apparition in the
| cosmos, capable of glimpsing the absurdity of our own
| existence.
|
| "What a piece of work is a man! How noble in reason, how
| infinite in faculty! In form and moving how express and
| admirable! In action how like an angel, in apprehension how
| like a god! The beauty of the world. The paragon of animals.
| And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust?"
| 082349872349872 wrote:
| Domesticated animals are far less aggressive than the wild
| types.
|
| However, I believe _Homo sapiens_ is already pretty
| domesticated. (neotenate, potentially herbivorous, able to
| breed in captivity, pleasant disposition, not prone to panic,
| willing to live in large hierarchically dominated herds)
| dheera wrote:
| > Domesticated animals are far less aggressive than the wild
| types.
|
| Dogs are far, far more aggressive than their wild
| counterparts. Their wild counterparts, in general, are not
| territorial against non-canids, and pretty much only attack
| if they are hungry.
| 082349872349872 wrote:
| TIL. I guess that's another indication that _Animal Farm_
| 's animal models were carefully chosen.
| z3t4 wrote:
| Dogs and cats are basically their wild counterpart bread to
| not be aggressive/dangerous (to humans).
| agumonkey wrote:
| It's a very interesting notion to me.. I spend my days thinking
| about the predatory environment of jobs in our 'modern'
| culture. I also believe that with a different seed, we could
| all have evolved job cultures very very much more iguanian.
| sushshshsh wrote:
| I really like the way you think! The open source movement is
| really getting closer and closer to this organizational
| structure.
|
| When you stop thinking about "how do I sell this software to
| other people so I can buy the things I need", and instead
| move to a model of everybody building software that can help
| humans obtain the things they need, I think the world
| changes.
| agumonkey wrote:
| I'm torn because I think the sales/survival pressure also
| avoids slacking off you see.
|
| Open source is not immune to false roads and mud.
| s0l1dsnak3123 wrote:
| You seem to equate slacking off with failure, when
| there's plenty of evidence to the contrary:
| https://blog.trello.com/slacking-off-speed-up-
| productivity
|
| It's important to separate what we _feel_ is productive
| work, from what will actually produce the most work on
| aggregate across society.
|
| I think we can build a world where those who feel they
| need downward or lateral pressure to get things done can
| have this, but not at the expense of everyone else.
| agumonkey wrote:
| Don't worry I have a fairly broad measure of productivism
| that doesn't take into account transient fluff.
|
| I meant slacking off as endless debates, running in
| circles and dropping things.
|
| The art is the fine balance between progress and debt.
| oss doesn't guarantee that.
| grawprog wrote:
| >What's even cooler is that the iguana also only eats seaweed
| and algae, which means it does not need to kill other animals
| to survive.
|
| It still needs to kill other organisms to eat. The only
| organisms that don't kill something else to gain energy are
| photosynthesizers and decomposers like fungi that consume dead
| organic matter.
| Turing_Machine wrote:
| And, of course, even the decomposers depend on death to
| survive. Perhaps not directly, but if things stopped dying
| fungi would be in bad shape.
| kiliantics wrote:
| > I am a firm believer that all of the war and crime you see in
| the world is driven by some biological wiring that most of us
| continental organism possess, from ants to humans.
|
| That is a very fatalist view that denies humans the agency we
| clearly have. We are obviously capable of devising social norms
| that go against our "biological wiring", whatever that even is.
| A simple proof is how varied social norms can be -- with
| respect to things like marriage/family, work, death, religion,
| etc. -- across different cultures in space and time.
|
| We have the power, collectively, to end the horrible practices
| that lead to war, exploitation, imprisonment/torture, climate
| change, and whatever else. These are not an inevitability. The
| idea that it is inevitable is more of a self-fulfilling
| prophecy that allows it to continue without any challenge.
|
| We have shown in many ways that we have risen above the
| determinism of many biological processes. We should realise
| that things can be different and change ourselves to be a part
| of that difference.
| FooBarBizBazz wrote:
| > change ourselves
|
| "Pray the gay away."
|
| Lobotomies.
| rzwitserloot wrote:
| Channeling some heinlein here:
|
| If we were all galapagos iguanas, well, then one of us iguanas
| will find a way to swim or otherwise get to a larger landmass.
| Or find a way to live in the ocean.
|
| Then, one of us would find a way to breed faster. After all,
| there is infinite seaweed and algae available to me.
|
| Eventually then, this adapted iguana will be so widespread,
| even if it remains docile and somehow does not evolve some
| territorial behaviour for mating purposes (unlikely), that,
| docile and all, it eats all the seaweed.
|
| Some seaweed will likely mutate into something that is harder
| to eat for the iguana, or poisons them and iguanas learn not to
| eat that (why? Well, there are a ton of iguanas - whatever
| iguana just mutates their genes into recognizing the poisonous
| one by taste or smell and won't eat it, will survive where the
| ones without the mutation will start dying off in droves).
|
| And now we have our war back.
|
| It's just between iguanas and the seaweed, which is now in an
| arms race: The iguanas adapt to deal with the poison, the
| seaweed adapts to come up with new poisons or otherwise make
| themselves harder to eat. The rules have changed: There are so
| many iguanas, that if you are easy to eat by an iguana, you, as
| a seaweed, are just not going to survive, because there are so
| many.
|
| Or, if the seaweed does not manage to be an equal aggressor in
| this fight, then something else happens: First massive, MASSIVE
| die-outs of iguanas due to starvation, and then eventually,
| aggressive behaviour between iguanas: If I manage to find a
| stretch of beach with a bunch of seaweed, and I just had some
| kids? Well, I can just stay docile. Or, I adapt to be
| aggressive, I chase off other (docile) iguanas hungry and on
| the lookout for seaweed, and thus ensure that my children
| survive whilst theirs die of starvation.
|
| War is inevitable, unless the system grows into 'acceptance', a
| self-balanced status quo where opportunities to expand exist
| but for whatever reason a part of the ecosystem just decides
| not to do this. For example, what if the iguana's somehow have
| a break built in and do not adapt. It's that or find a lifeform
| that requires literally zero resources.
|
| The problem is, given that this is an utopic view where life is
| great and nothing needs to change and there are no external
| pressures to adapt, why would you invent anything? Until some
| external force shows up and changes things, life will continue
| stable forever, with iguanas doing iguana things and seaweed
| doing seaweed things.
|
| Heinlein's principle is that this can only hold if you are
| literally the only life in the entire universe (or all life is
| like this), because if not, one day one of the ecosystems that
| decided to 'war' and grow will obliterate you. They don't play
| by the same rules.
| sushshshsh wrote:
| I'm going to leave aside your points about seaweed evolution
| and iguana evolution because they are definitely correct and
| would lead to the collapse of the system I described.
| Externalities are a real beast!
|
| Hehe, well, if humans were able to survive off of sunlight
| alone, then the only reason to kill something would be "for
| fun", or in other words, the result of what we would call a
| mental illness.
|
| I wonder if there has ever been an Galapagos iguana vs
| Galapagos iguana murder. I don't even think they possess the
| physical capability to murder each other, like, their mouths
| and hands don't generate enough energy to pierce skin or
| constrict blood flow or deliver blunt force trauma.
|
| If iguanas were able to survive on sunlight alone, eventually
| they would hit carrying capacity of the place in which they
| live.
| delibes wrote:
| Huh? I seem to recall watching the series "Planet Earth 2" and
| there was some tense scenes with iguanas and snakes:
|
| https://www.vulture.com/2017/02/planet-earth-ii-iguana-snake...
|
| Looks like they have a predator to me.
|
| You might have a point about war and in general consumption
| being a 'wired-in' behaviour. Then again assuming we have
| something like intelligence and free will, we should be able to
| choose to override some primitive behaviour.
| optimiz3 wrote:
| Society's fundamental value is channeling the unpleasant
| aspects of our nature to create a net benefit for all. It is
| folly to fight the natural drive to compete. Instead focus on
| systems that channel that drive into innovation and production.
| There will always be haves and have-nots as long as there is
| evolutionary selection.
|
| My favorite metaphor is to think of humanity as gasoline. Left
| alone it explodes, but put in an engine it does useful work.
| Society and its laws are the engine that channels destructive
| force into useful output.
| timmytokyo wrote:
| Nature, red in tooth and claw.
| V-2 wrote:
| Long live indeed, since iguanas are considered vulnerable to
| extinction. In fact, they already went extinct once on Santiago
| Island (one of the largest of the Galapagos) - they've been
| reintroduced by humans as part of a restoration program. This
| shows limitations of their strategy.
| looping__lui wrote:
| Or another outcome could have been: all the seaweed and plants
| get eaten up, don't regrow in time and we would have just
| vanished. Not sure how the seaweed would have felt about that
| either.
|
| Some organism would have realized that hunting down other stuff
| is easier and more nutritious than chewing on seaweed.
| DenisM wrote:
| Adversity is the mother of progress. You can see it everywhere
| - biological evolution, societal evolution, technology,
| economics.
|
| Perhaps a more merciful way to lose would be helpful.
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| Not following. Iguanas _did evolve_. We also evolved. Those
| that evolved to be 'more like iguanas' actually happened - we
| call them 'iguanas' and they are lizards. Not doing too well.
|
| The fact is a certain brainy old-world ape has taken over the
| biosphere. Because evolution gave them the biological tools to
| do so. That's what evolution does.
|
| We'd have to propose something different from evolution, to get
| a different result.
| solidsnack9000 wrote:
| Some of the best features of people are the result of
| competitive evolution -- it's not just our worst features that
| come from the struggle for survival.
|
| The iguana's war on algae is definitely hell for the algae. Is
| not killing other animals such a great distinction, in the
| grand scheme of things?
|
| If all the animals were vegetarian and weren't getting preyed
| on, most of them would die of starvation. (Most birds, rabbits,
| &c die early -- it's not like people where surviving to
| adulthood is the norm.) The animals that killed the other
| animals to have more vegetables to eat would have more
| offspring and be more likely to survive. Killing others not to
| eat them but to eat their stuff -- that's war.
|
| The iguana situation is one where there's just not much
| evolutionary pressure. It doesn't generalize.
| lisper wrote:
| Algae doesn't have a brain, or even a nervous system, so
| eating algae instead of other animals really is a net win on
| the kumbaya scale.
| tommica wrote:
| But if everyone eats algae, then there is no algae left!
| lisper wrote:
| And yet somehow there is still enough algae in the
| Galapagos for the iguanas to survive. Gee, I wonder how
| that could be possible.
| Volundr wrote:
| That's only true if algae is incapable of reproducing as
| fast as it's consumed. In my experience running an
| aquaponics system this isn't a concern.
| DamnYuppie wrote:
| Almost all organisms evolved to kill or be killed.
|
| The entire universe is chaos and continual destruction and
| creation.
|
| By ignoring the innate human nature to struggle and fight you
| are not removing it or making it go away. You are merely making
| it more likely that your society will inevitably fall to
| another that is more aggressive, assertive, or war like. In all
| of history decedent societies continually fall to more barbaric
| and less advanced societies.
| jdc wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Is%E2%80%93ought_problem
| Veluga wrote:
| I don't think you got OP's point at all.
| katzgrau wrote:
| I think it's somewhat inevitable that in times of scarcity, the
| most aggressive (either psychologically or physically) members
| of a species are going wind up surviving and passing on the
| traits that helped them survive, for good or worse.
|
| Were living with the reality of that, as much as I'd also like
| it to not be the case.
| thisisauserid wrote:
| Your ability to feel sadness evolved from the thing you are sad
| about.
| plasticchris wrote:
| Racer snakes eat baby iguanas. Galapagos hawks eat full grown
| adults.
| disown wrote:
| > the iguana is completely docile to all other organisms around
| it. What's even cooler is that the iguana also only eats
| seaweed and algae
|
| Seaweed and algae are organisms as well. Plants don't want to
| be killed and eaten no more than animals do. I think
| Attenborough or BBC's documentary on plants showed the lengths
| plants go through to avoid being eaten and communicating danger
| to other plants.
|
| > I am a firm believer that all of the war and crime you see in
| the world is driven by some biological wiring that most of us
| continental organism possess, from ants to humans.
|
| It's not just continental, it happens in the oceans as well.
| It's not just animals, microbes/bacteria/etc also kill and eat.
| It's even happening all over your body right now. It's been
| happening millions of years before the dinosaurs.
|
| > If we had all evolved to be more like iguanas, I wonder if
| society would have made more (or less!) technological and
| societal progress, given that a lot of technological
| advancements come from the demands of war--
|
| Probably less. The only reason galapagos iguanas exist is
| because they are isolated from competition and are adapted to a
| specific environment. Humans are more general while the
| galapagos iguana is specialized. It's like the difference
| between a computer and a calculator.
| Adferdfqwer wrote:
| Jssusu
| Adferdfqwer wrote:
| Jajs
| dontcarethrow2 wrote:
| Ooh but we always war in nature, we can never change. Greed?
| thats just nature, f the weaklings who cant protect themselves.
| Whos fault is it they can protect themselves? /s
|
| It sounds like we pick whatever is most convenient for us of the
| day. Everything disguised in 'its just nature'. We made change
| and we have left nature behind, we can continue in changing our
| uglier parts, but it sure as shit isn't convenient when most of
| our congress needs to be tried for war crimes, held responsible.
| That is too inconvenient, so let's all marvel at this study that
| says War War War!
| jungletime wrote:
| Reminds me of "Heart of Darkness". Marlow, an 1800s explorer,
| goes up the Congo, and at some point is corrupted by evil and
| loses his mind in the jungle. Becomes a demigod figure, served
| and worshiped by the local natives. He decorates his fence posts,
| with skulls, facing his hut. Usually they face out, to keep the
| evil out. But not with Marlow.
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