What Ants tell us about Human Consciousness: Intelligence from Ignorance

Tireless workers walk hundreds of meters in perfect lines, ferrying forest bounty back to their home. But this precious cargo, meticulously prepared by dedicated chefs, isn’t for them. It’s for their tiny, beloved pets — domesticated fungi cultivated for over 65 million years. Compare that to human civilisation of less than 10,000 years.

Inside the complex leaf-cutter ant society, specialized chefs tirelessly process leaves into a nutritious pulp. This carefully prepared substrate fuels the growth of their cultivated fungus, which reciprocates by producing nutrient-rich “gongylidia,” the fungal bread.

While carefully harvested “gongylidia” nourish every ant, from queen to worker, the sophisticated operation that sustains this vibrant community thrives on a fascinating paradox.

Though it resembles a meticulously-ordered, top-down structure, a closer look reveals the truth: this complex civilization navigates the world on algorithmic automation. No central intelligence, queen or king, dictates the actions; instead, the intelligent ant civilisation emerges from the collective, decentralized interactions of individual ants, each operating with a surprisingly limited intelligence, and very few set of instructions.

Over fifteen years, the colony evolves from infancy, to adolescence, to mature phase, as if they are individuals with personalities. Young colonies buzz with reckless energy, eager to brawl for every scrap. But age brings wisdom, and as years pass, they learn to navigate the world with a seasoned calm, avoiding needless conflict.

What’s surprising is that this evolution transcends individual memories, for even though ants live but a year (save the queen), the civilization retains collective wisdom. The individual ants are just reacting to local pheromones signal. Individual ants of the mature colonies have no memory of the young reckless founders. But still the learning’s from the mistakes of the young colony become ingrained habits, woven into the fabric of culture, guiding the actions of future generations.

Behaviour of slime moulds, swarms of bees, ant colonies and bird flocks offer a fascinating glimpse into this different kind of intelligence: collective wisdom. Each individuals only interact with their neighbours. This “emergent” intelligence arises from the interactions of simple individuals, each with their own tiny goals. It’s like magic but fueled by numbers: the more dancers, the richer the collective choreography.

And how does this work? Here are five key ingredients:

Critical Mass: Just like a party needs enough guests to get lively, emergent systems need a certain population size for the magic to happen. It is a collective action of ignorant individuals with micromotives producing an intelligent macro behaviour. More is different.

Ignorance is bliss: Think of each individual like a musician following a simple sheet. Individually, it’s basic, but together, they create a symphony. The complex interactions between the simple parts would trickle up into a complex and sophisticated behaviour. Moment you have an all knowing leader giving instructions, or individuals behaving as a separate entity without interacting with neighbours, the system breaks down.

Encourage random encounters: No conductor needed! Emergent systems thrive on independent choices, fueled by random local interactions and information exchange.

Look for patterns in the signs: Think of each individual sensing the “vibe” around them without being aware of what’s going on in the entire city. This local awareness plays a key role in shaping overall behaviour.

Pay attention to your neighbours: Like gossip during random encounters at the office water cooler, sharing information with neighbours helps solve local problems and keeps the whole system in tune. Individual ants are unaware of how many foragers and nest builders are there in the colony. All they know is the ratio based on the pheromone trails. Individual ants are programmed to take up the job of the less dominant pheromone of the two. By this simple rule, the balance between the different jobs of the entire colony of tens of thousands of ants is maintained. Without these interactions it would be a swarm without logic.

By understanding these principles, we might find that collective wisdom isn’t just for ants and birds. Perhaps it holds secrets about how human groups tap into their own hidden potential, creating vibrant communities and solving complex problems together.

From the bustling, unthinking ants in a colony to the quiet symphony of neurons in our brains, nature paints a fascinating picture of complexity rising from simplicity.

Our bodies themselves are intricate ecosystems of cells unaware of our existence, just as those cells are built from even more fundamental, oblivious atoms. My individual cells do not function to create me, rather, I emerge from the local interaction of cells, trained to behave in a particular way by millions of years of evolution.

Zooming further in, the fundamental particles are unaware of the atoms it creates, and the strings of energy, if string theory is valid, are unaware of the fundamental particles.

While hydrogen is flammable and oxygen helps in combustion, when they combine, their emergent property is totally different from the individual atoms. The combined molecule, we call water, is good at extinguishing fire.

This hierarchy of “ignorant” (figuratively) individuals, each playing their role, culminates in the emergence of something far more intricate and profound than the sum of its parts.

Our conscience and intelligence emerges from the complex interaction of huge numbers of neurons, that individually are neither intelligent nor conscious.

Consciousness doesn’t reside in specific neurons but emerges from the complex interactions between vast networks of neurons in specific brain regions. Each neuron interacts with its neighbour only. These networks integrate information from various areas, and the resulting synchronized activity is thought to generate the subjective unified experience of consciousness. Consciousness is more than the sum of the neurons, just like we are more than the sum of our cells.

We are not our neurons and cells, we are much more. Yet, we are nothing without them.

Self-organising system isn’t just an anomaly, but a norm throughout the cosmos. Just like bustling ant colonies – a tapestry of simple actions weaving a complex existence, human cities teem with individual lives, yet hum with a collective pulse. Cities have “latent purpose” beyond any single inhabitant’s grasp.

The sidewalks and plazas are city’s arteries, akin to the pheromone trails of ants, where we have random encounters and gossips. This allows transfer of information and knowledge, that changes the behaviour of individuals. This constant exchange shapes the city’s soul, its “latent purpose” of storing and retrieving information. While individuals trade, seek solace, and pursue their own dreams, the city silently gathers and transmits collective wisdom, transcending the limitations of our individual minds. That’s why many modern cities without sidewalks are so unstable and have high crime rates.

This collective tapestry of minds, woven within cities, has allowed us to collaborate beyond the confines of our Dunbar number (~150 individuals), propelling our species forward through innovation and shared cultural memory. It’s a similar magic at play in complex software, where simple binary lines of code give rise to remarkable artificial intelligence.

These emergent complex systems are often confused with chaotic systems (Chaos Theory), but they are different.

Complex systems are Self-organizing: They arrange themselves like magic, finding “sweet spots” without outside control. Unlike chaotic systems, they resist disorder.

Complex systems are Out of equilibrium: Never truly still, constantly evolving like a bubbling spring. Open to their surroundings, unlike closed systems where outside noises don’t matter.

Complex systems have Feedback loops: Outputs feed back in, like dominoes toppling, sometimes amplifying change (positive feedback) or calming things down (negative feedback).

Complex systems Coevolve: Micro and macro dance: small parts influence the whole, which then shapes the parts back, a continuous feedback loop shaping the system like sculptor and clay.

Unlike chaotic systems, complex systems boast a remarkable talent for self-organization relative to their environment, leading to a gradual increase in robustness over time. This dynamic interplay between internal components and external forces empowers them to resist disruptions and adapt to change.

Perhaps this intricate dance of complex systems continues even at larger scales. Individual cultures and nations intertwine, weaving a global tapestry of shared experiences and ideas. And who knows, maybe even this global symphony whispers hints of something vaster, a collective intelligence yet to be fully grasped.

Emergence and the science of complexity, though still a work in progress, is a revolutionary idea that describes how simple things, interacting in specific ways, can give rise to complex self-organising systems. While still a work in progress, it is bound to change the way we look at the world.