<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:19.2px"> Wouldn’t it be cool if we figured out how to synthesize whatever drives them and cause a pest colony to drop what they are doing and fight each other? spike</span><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:19.2px"><br></span></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:19.2px">I thought you just had to take a few of one and dump them on the other's hill and vice versa. bill w</span></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:19.2px">----------</span></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"><p class="MsoNormal" style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:19.2px">Wouldn’t it be cool if we were to stop fighting each other and work on only real problems?<span class="gmail-HOEnZb"><font color="#888888"><u></u><u></u></font></span></p><span class="gmail-HOEnZb" style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:19.2px"><font color="#888888"><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal">spike</p><p class="MsoNormal"><br></p><p class="MsoNormal">I truly wish everyone would read "Moral Tribes";. Mostly utilitarian morals at the end and new ways of looking at the US versus THEM problems. But it may be pie in the sky - it requires a metaethics that enables people of different beliefs to compromise. Otherwise we will always have 'my god is the only one' - 'no mine is' and on and on ad nauseam ad infinitum. Or substitute for 'god' any set of beliefs of your tribe.</p><p class="MsoNormal"><br></p><p class="MsoNormal">bill w</p><p class="MsoNormal"><br></p></font></span></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:19.2px"><br></span></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:19.2px"><br></span></div></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Mon, Sep 11, 2017 at 8:42 AM, spike <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:spike66@att.net" target="_blank">spike66@att.net</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div lang="EN-US" link="blue" vlink="purple"><div class="m_-3941847462725598619WordSection1"><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"><b>From:</b> extropy-chat [mailto:<a href="mailto:extropy-chat-bounces@lists.extropy.org" target="_blank">extropy-chat-bounces@<wbr>lists.extropy.org</a>] <b>On Behalf Of </b>CryptAxe<br><b>Subject:</b> Re: [ExI] ants again<u></u><u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><div><p class="MsoNormal">>…So does this make you ant god? :) <u></u><u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal">Ja, and I demand they worship me on bended knee (all six.)<u></u><u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><div><p class="MsoNormal">>…Do you think they are so focused on murdering eachother that they don't notice you?<u></u><u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal">This is an interesting question. Ants (and bees) don’t really reason through a plan and carry it out (as far as I can tell.) They just act on instinct driven by the chemical environment in their tiny brains. But other than that, they aren’t much like humans.<u></u><u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal">>…Why don't they team up against the bigger enemy?<u></u><u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal">Hard to say. Consider this however. We know that they don’t really act on command of a queen (she is just as dumb as her sisters.) They don’t have any kind of audible commands they give each other, no waving the antennae like semaphore flags or anything. It is all chemical signaling that makes them go and they act in hive-minded unison when that chemical or pheromone is present.<u></u><u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal">We have ant control poisons which work to some extent which have unintended and undesirable side effects. Wouldn’t it be cool if we figured out how to synthesize whatever drives them and cause a pest colony to drop what they are doing and fight each other? Or how about a chemical which is laid down in a trail carried by a tiny crawl-bot which goes inside your walls and finds the termite colony, then instructs them to fight the termites? We find two warring colonies, a big pile of them like I found yesterday, scoop a million of them into a cup, put in a drop of chemical tranquilizer which tells them “calm down, let that bitch go.” <u></u><u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal">We take them to our house, they go up the chem-trail, fight the termites to the death. Then they perish, because there is no queen in an ant war.<u></u><u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal">>…I wonder what kind of reaction humans would have if something bigger and smarter scooped us all up right now in the middle of our bickering?<u></u><u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal">Wouldn’t it be cool if we were to stop fighting each other and work on only real problems?<span class="HOEnZb"><font color="#888888"><u></u><u></u></font></span></p><span class="HOEnZb"><font color="#888888"><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal">spike<u></u><u></u></p><p class="MsoNormal"> <u></u><u></u></p></font></span></div></div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p></div></div></div><br>______________________________<wbr>_________________<br>
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