Insects

Let Nature Speak – Learning from Ants (documentary)

https://youtube.com/watch?v=Z-gIx7LXcQM

We all love seeing nature at work. Although we’ve done immense damage to natural systems worldwide, the earth’s beauty still seems boundless, as is the spectacular complexity of the creatures that inhabit it. But beyond its beauty lies something arguably more valuable — lessons that help us in our own lives. People who are in regular contact with nature and nature’s systems know well what I’m trying to say here.

This particular video focusses on that busy and ingenious creature, the ant. Ants live virtually everywhere on our planet — they are said to form between 15-25% of all terrestrial animal biomass! You could say they are rather ‘successful’, and yet they do not subscribe to an ‘every man for himself’ mentality. Although there are many kinds of ant species around the world, with varying degrees of ‘social consciousness’, if I can call it that, they almost universally thrive through cooperation, and self-sacrifice for the greater good.

Most of the work ants accomplish would be impossible if individuals were working independently. If you juxtapose the society of an ant colony with one of our own cities, you will see that the atomisation and individualism that modern, industrial consumer society has fostered has bred powerlessness and apathy, instead of the ‘super-organism’ power that an ant colony displays to us. I feel the permaculture movement, and society at large, needs to revisit its more community-minded past if we’re ever to have the leveraging tools available to enable us to mobilise to face the challenges we do today. What’s the old saying? United we stand….

In addition to the ants’ own social structure, the video shows some practical examples of how the colony creates symbiotic relationships with other creatures — forming partnerships, rather than merely seeking to exterminate. All in all it’s a thought-provoking watch I’m sure you’ll enjoy.

If you don’t have time to watch the whole video above, or even if you do, be sure to watch the one below as well — talking about the ‘we’ culture, instead of the ‘me’ culture. I just love the example one teacher of indigenous children told, on how they refused to play a ball game unless the game could finish when the two sides had reached a draw. The childrens’ culture had given them a "we’re all in this together" mindset that made them spurn competition. It’s clear that indigenous cultures have much more to teach us, than we them….

One Comment

  1. What a beautiful documentary. Most thinks i already new, but it stays a wonder. However it’s discusting what the people do to the ants. As if they are there supperiors. Destroying dat very disfisticated leafcutter ants nest and playing as a god with experimenting with the ants nests and the individuals. I think we could learn a great deal from them, because they already are more disfisticated as us. Greeting from the Netherlands.

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