ANThropology: Art and Life of a Superorganism

“Sa mundong kay laki, sino ba naman ang magbibigay pansin sa mga makukulit– na
magkakanda duling ka sa liit? Sa apat na sulok ng ating mga kwarto, bakit ko naman bibigyan
pansin ang mga maliliit na magkakanda-duling ako sa kulit? “

Sometimes, we stay too occupied with our problems that we tend to forget about
perspectives not connected to human benefit. A few days ago, I decided to step out of the 4 walls
of my unit and walk around the area near my condominium – in an attempt to give myself a
breather after weeks of constant academic and social commitments. In almost a week of my
observation, I tried to find things that I can compare to the world that I live in. Of course, in my
desire to stand out or be unique in the thing I have chosen, I try to find unique ones. I took the
usual path surrounding the building but it did not take long to pass a share of companions along
the way. People going to work, people coming from it, people walking their pets, and other
people going about their day. This time however, maybe the reason being this exercise, I was a
bit more aware of my surroundings. I let my focus travel to the varying trees around the path as I
passed the shade they put over my head and I took notice of the flowers growing by their feet.
Then, at a line of sight I almost never spare a second glance at, I see a superorganism so close to
me on the sidewalk that I could have stepped on it. Usually, I would just be on my way but with
my mind still on about the text, I wondered how long it could have been walking with me.

Known as the very industrious superorgnanisms, that are responsible for their respective
castes– queens, workers and soldiers. These are the words or the general things you know about
ants. Aside from their scientific name, Formicidae, television shows show that they live in
colonies– they are very hardworking, and that they usually have a colony leader. Beyond the
usual facts, ants actually count their steps when they walk. In 2009, in the University of Ulm,
Harold Wolf and his assistant Matthias Wittlinger conducted an experiment to test their proposed
idea that ants count the steps they take using “pedometer-like” cells in their brains. Within that
test, they separated the colony into three groups: one normal, one with pig-bristles attached to
their legs (essentially stilts), and the last one with their legs cut just a bit to make them shorter.
When they made their way back, the first group made it back without a problem, the second
group passed the entrance before searching around for it, and the third group fell short from the
nest. They all counted the same number of steps it would usually take to get home. When you
first read about the research, it sounds fascinating but maybe the reason for that fascination lies
in the realization that we relate that conscious ability to one that we expected only humans to
have (or at the very least we never thought about it). There seems to be a sense of captivation
over the thought of systems and awareness existing in any other form other than humans and
apart from the experiment, my experience was one of those moments.
 I watch as it does not wait for me and continues on ahead and I wonder if it is too busy
counting its steps to realize I was trailing behind. Then I wondered what else it could have been
thinking of. The ant makes its way along the sidewalk and I notice that at the contact of one of its
legs to one of the metal pieces that hold down street signs, it hesitates before going around it. It
was probably surprised at the loss of warmth it was feeling as it walked along the grass and dirt. I
know the growing issue has been on preserving ecosystems amidst man’s desire to build
infrastructures, but instead of seeing the monumental consequence of deforestation, I was seeing
the effects of it to an ant. Watching it avoid the metal piece made me think of just how much the
rest of the world must be adjusting due to human activity. The ant walks around the cold material
and the additional steps mean that it might lose its way on its way back home. Like an ant, I see
obstacles as challenges in life, we can back down and shrink from it, or we can stand up and face
it head-on. Challenges are a part of our everyday life. It makes us stronger and without it, life
becomes somewhat meaningless because we have nothing to compare the good times to. It is
indeed fascinating how successful people and these superorganisms approach problems. Where
others see impenetrable barriers, they see challenges to embrace and obstacles to overcome.
However, despite our best effort to avoid it, challenges arise and threaten our journey; we must
handle them. Still, it continues on, probably forgetting the inconvenience to focus on more
important things and I felt as if it accepted the need to coexist with change in a manner that I
wished we could do for them. As we progress as a society, we need to do more than trying not to
step on anyone’s toes. It should be a matter of prioritizing the nourishment of the rest of the
living world and not just trying to do the least amount of damage to it.

Given this sense of importance human beings have put on ourselves, it is now crucial to
mirror that empathy to the other beings living alongside us. In the simplest ways, we have a lot in
common with other species. Aside from the basics such as needing to eat, and feeling an
instinctual level of fear, there are many other actions not limited to us. Other beings may also be
fond of socialization, some react to music, some have courting rituals, and some instill
hierarchies. Though tiny, ants can have huge, complex colonies and networks. Along with this
comes its own set of tensions and politics. If the ant ever returns home, it would be to feed its
queen who was selected just as our leaders in politics were, minus the democratic election. Even
after both species select their leaders, the rest of those in the groups have their own
responsibilities such as the division of labor and the expectation to respect their leaders. As a law
student, it is astounding that even these superorganisms can parallel our own politics. In a system
organised by division of labour, each individual specialises in a particular task. Division of
labour offers advantages to ant colonies and human society because, among other reasons,
people differ in abilities and responsibilities. They have a colony, we have a country. They have
a queen, we have a president. They have workers, we have Filipino labourers. They have
soldiers, we have the Philippine National Police. In fact, most ant colonies are so united toward
the common purposes of survival, development, and reproduction. And if only we work and act
like ants, I believe there would be a more harmonious and progressive country and a fair system
of government. But, what separates this common experience is the complication that humans
add to our own politics but in its essence, we are not above the rest of the biosphere.

What humans have is not the innate importance over everything else but the resources
gathered over the years to protect all other things. Outside of our lives, the rest of the world will
continue to exist. They will deal with their own version of worries, just maybe not worries of
education or of job hunting. Despite the differences, it is important to cling on to the thought that
we share this lifetime with them. We are all experiencing the changes of the world at the same
time, man-made or not. In this lifetime, I hope to see it not spent with such selfishness and greed
but spent as an experience to enrich as well as nurture the living world for the generations of life
to come, not limited to our own. To others, they may not be able to draw attention, but with the
help of Anna Tsing's Art of Noticing, I learned to recognize. Amitav Ghosh also said,
"Recognition is famously a passage from ignorance to knowledge". Because of this, I came to a
realization that I have to give recognition even to the simplest organisms, because they may be
meaningful to us and may explain the dynamic world we live in. We must give attention to the
smallest of things, for a reason that we might be hanging out with the soldiers or even the queen
of the ant colony. Who knows?