Ant (Animal) PDF
Preview Ant (Animal)
A nt Charlotte Sleigh Animal series Ant Animal Serieseditor:JonathanBurt Alreadypublished Crow BoriaSax Tortoise PeterYoung Cockroach MarionCopeland Forthcoming Wolf Falcon GarryMarvin HelenMacdonald Bear Parrot RobertE.Bieder PaulCarter Horse Whale SarahWintle JosephRoman Spider Rat LeslieDick JonathanBurt Dog Hare SusanMcHugh SimonCarnell Snake Bee DrakeStutesman ClairePreston Oyster RebeccaStott Ant CharlotteSleigh reaktion books ForMary,whoisprettywiseforatwo-leggedanimal. Publishedby reaktionbooksltd 79FarringdonRoad Londonec1m3ju,uk www.reaktionbooks.co.uk Firstpublished2003 Copyright©CharlotteSleigh2003 Allrightsreserved Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced,storedinaretrieval systemortransmitted,inanyformorbyanymeans,electronic, mechanical,photocopying,recordingorotherwisewithouttheprior permissionofthepublishers. PrintedandboundinHongKong BritishLibraryCataloguinginPublicationData Sleigh,Charlotte Ant.–(Animal) 1.Ants 2.Animalsandcivilization I.Title 595.7’96 isbn1861891903 Contents 1 Introduction 7 2 AntsasMinions 28 3 AntsasModels 58 4 TheEnemyWithout 87 5 TheEnemyWithin 116 6 AntsasMachines 142 7 TheAmbiguousAnt 167 Timeline 192 References 194 Bibliography 205 Associations 207 Websites 208 Acknowledgements 209 PhotoAcknowledgements 210 Index 213 Ants(Formicae)onananthill,aminiaturefromaFrenchbestiaryofc.1450. 1 Introduction Itisextraordinarilydifficulttoavoidusinggrandioseadjectives inthedescriptionofants. Antscommandarespectfromtheirfansoutofallproportion totheinsects’size.Ants,theyaffirm,arethe‘-est’insects:the cleverest,mostorganized,hardest-working,mostnumerous, mostfecund,mostdominant;theyareolderthanhumans,more bellicose, more cooperative, more communicative. Frequently thesecomparisonsborderonthebizarre.Achildren’swebsite asserts:‘Antbrainsarelargestamongstinsects...Ithasbeen estimated that an ant’s brain may have the same processing powerasaMacintoshiicomputer.’1 At least, all this is what myrmecologists (those who study ants)wouldhaveusbelieve.Thoughtheirpreciseclaimshave changedovertime,westernstudentsofantsalwaysseemto havemadehyperbolicassertionsaboutthem. TheeighteenthcenturynaturalphilosopherRéaumurstarted atabasiclevelinhiscatalogueoftheextraordinaryqualities of ants: ‘we have for them none of those aversions that are frequentlyentertainedtowardssomanyotherinsects’.2Our dispassionate attitude towards them compared to, say, cock- roaches,signalstheirhumanstatus;theirexistenceisparallel withourown.Unlikefleas,theyhavenoparticulardependence upon us, and we have no need for them as we do for bees. 7 Thisindependentexistenceofantshas,atvarioustimes,been a source both of wonder and of horror. Thomas Mouffet, a sixteenth-centuryphysician,notedthattheants . . . are so exemplary . . . it is no wonder that Plato, Phaedone, hath determined that they who without the help of philosophy have lead a civill life by custom or fromtheirowndiligence,theyhadtheirsoulsfromAnts, andwhentheydietheyareturnedtoantsagain.3 Here,theants’lackofrelianceuponphilosophymarksoutthe alternativeyetequivalentnatureoftheirciviclives:aparallelso wondrousthat,accordingtoPliny,theyaretheonlycreatures besides us that bury their dead with funeral rites. More contemporary analogue-myths assert with equal confidence thatants,ifmagnifiedtothesizeofsheep,wouldruletheearth, andthatintheeventofanuclearholocausttheywouldoutlast humans. In between the eras of Plato and nato, observers have concoctedacanonofastoundingfactsandfiguresconcerning thenumbersofants,theirdistribution,theirreproductionand modes of life. They are habitually scaled up to ‘equate’ to humanterms,uponwhichbasistheirnestsarecomparedtothe pyramids,ortotheGreatWallofChina,andtheirmovement withthatofaspeedingtrain.Theyhaverecentlybeenenumer- ated at ten thousand trillion; collectively they are asserted to weighasmuchastheearth’shumanpopulation.E.O.Wilson, the most renowned living myrmecologist, claims that the behaviourofantsisscientificallymoreinterestingthanthatof humans’bestialcousinandthepsychologists’currentfavourite, the chimp. The reason for this, he writes, is that ants can be studiedforthemeaningoftheirsocialinteraction,whereasthe 8
Description:The list of books you might like
