Thread: Humans aren't the only senitent creatures on Earth....

Yes, it is true... Ants are sentient creatures. They also share an IMMENSE amount of traits with humans.

1. Complex social structure.
2. Self-awareness
3. Central government (You could call ants communist)
4. Ability to farm, build, and have symbiotic realationships in full awareness.
5. Strategize during inter-colonial wars.

1. This is observable in any ant hill. Every ants has a job, and they communicate with each other. They also have a caste system.

2. This can be studied in laboratories with ants faced with life or death challenges.

3. This can be observed in the common ant hill. The queen regulates everything from food stock, to population, and assigning jobs.

4. Some ants literally farm smaller organisms for the food they produce. They also are know to build complex structures out of any kind of dirt or sand, and leaves, and sticks. They even sometimes use other ants as their structure. Some ants also farm a sort of fungi which both feeds them, and gives them shelter, in return for food.

5. Again, watch ants fight, and you will see common military strategies. All-out force. Column attacks, etc.

Now... What do you think?

Originally Posted by Seismosaur

Now... What do you think?

I think an ant-war just made my list of things I have to see before I die.

Originally Posted by Seismosaur

Now... What do you think?

Hmm...kinda makes me want to get a magnifying glass. And NO, I don't mean to fry them.

Originally Posted by Aquanina

Hmm...kinda makes me want to get a magnifying glass. And NO, I don't mean to fry them.

Frying ants is the best!!! Dude, i could go to town on an antpile for hours. Theres so many of them!!! On my cousins' farm we shoot hunting rifles at 2 foot high ant piles and watch them explode. Good fun. The cow-pie mushrooms make it even better Pour lighter fluid on them and cook marshmellows, brewski in my left hand. This is takin me back to the good ol' days.

What about dolphins and elephants. I once heard elephants morn their dead.

Originally Posted by Half/Dreaming

Frying ants is the best!!! Dude, i could go to town on an antpile for hours. Theres so many of them!!! On my cousins' farm we shoot hunting rifles at 2 foot high ant piles and watch them explode. Good fun. The cow-pie mushrooms make it even better Pour lighter fluid on them and cook marshmellows, brewski in my left hand. This is takin me back to the good ol' days.

What about dolphins and elephants. I once heard elephants morn their dead.

1. killing ants is awful!!!!

2. cow-pie mushrooms...you mean...like...of the psychedelic variety??

3. yes, elephants do mourn their dead...it's actually a really sad sight

Haha, imagine if ants built an actual dirt castle...that'd be an odd sight.

You forgot something--some ants make slaves of other ant species that they conquer.

Ants are brilliant. Did you know that in wars, they even have spies? Somehow they can mimic the smell of the other colony they are fighting or something.

Still, ants make way to cool sounds Not to burn them with a magnifying glass.. at least, it used to be fun

Mucho respect for ants, besides that.

Originally Posted by Oneironaut

[Edit: Dogs have been known to mourn their dead companions also. A good number of them actually starve themselves to death, after the death of their companions.]

Yes, this is true. When my older dog was killed, her companion (whom she raised) stopped eating, and just sat under a tree, looking at her burial site. It was a good thing he had another dog to comfort him... Else he would have died.


This thread was just to show that humans AREN'T alone. And i'm glad i have many people who agree . Me an my sister once LITERALLY built a small ant hill next to a black-colored sugar ant hill. We then placed 34 fire-ants in it, and a mound of sugar, and bits of bread. Within 10 minutes, the 34 fier-ants were killed, and the black sugar ants had moved to our hill. While watching this. I saw that several black sugar ants had taken the dead fire-ants and buried them . They stayed at the spot for a moment, as if to pay respect or something, them walked off to help with the rest of the hill. I'll NEVER forget that.

Ants have not got a collective intelligence, however their behavior is somewhat more complex then other animals.

just for the record, we are Sapient.

LOL. The term is sentient. Sapient refers to homo sapiens ability to rationalize, make religion, etc. Ants are one of the most sentient creatures on the planet. DEAL WITH IT. I'll bet you got that off of wikipedia. Well, if you hadn't noticed, the article was so wrong, and SOO F*cked up, it sayed at the top that it would need a complete re-write.

I didn't say that they weren't. I'm not even wrong. We are sapient. Just about every mammal is sentient. Sentient means aware.

I repeat: We are sapient. That is why we are called Homo Sapien Sapien

This is religions terrestrial scale:
@-------------------------------------------------------------------*
^not sentient.......................................... ..........................Sentient^

@ = animals * = Humans (H. Sapiens) - = Nothing, we just had to make it as long as the real chart .

This is (a summerized version of) science's sentiecy chart:
@--------------#---------------$-----%--------------^====+=][][!*

^...........................................^..... ............................................^
little-No sentiecy.................Moderate sentiecy.........................Supersentiecy

@ = bacteria # = Equus $ = Modern Birds of Prey % = Most small Therapods (i.e. Velociraptor) ^ = Chimpanzees and other Non-Homo primates = = Sentiecy gap + = Ants (all species) ][][ = early - mid Homo species ! = H. Neanderthalensis * = H. Sapiens

Sentient means aware conciously. Sapient refers to H. Sapiens version of sentiecy. As this is the driving force behind our "soul" which has yet to be even REMOTLEY proven to even POSSIBLY exist.

avoiding a religious discussion, are you saying I am wrong to call us Sapient?