[MD] Social Ants?

[Gene M]

On 6/19/06, Case <case at ispots.com> wrote:
>
> [Gene]
> > And I would argue that those are forms of Society. If a certain sound
> > means
> > "Get Down!!" for prairie dogs, and each one recognizes it and can make
> it,
> > then I think that constitutes a rudimentary language, and a rudimentary
> > society. Especially if the meaning of those sounds is learned from
> > experience, and not innate in the individuals. I think it's a fair
> slice.
>
> [Case]
> Drawing a line in the sand for where instinct ends and learning begins is
> touchy even in humans. This is one reason I think leaving social animals
> out of the social level is not a good thing. One of the things
> developmental psychologists have to teach us is that humans are not tabla
> rasa at the get go either.
>
> If finding distinctions beween human and other forms of society is that
> important to you, I think Horse's ideas about centralized versus
> distributed processing have some merit. I might also throw in something
> about internal versus external locus of control among individuals in a
> society. But not sure at the moment where that will lead.


I dunno where you got the idea that "finding distinctions beween human and
other forms of society" is important to me. It's not. At all. I'm one of the
people who thinks that the idea of Social can be used readily for all sorts
of other animal species.

That is the point of my slice. I think it makes a nice distinction between
learning and innate knowledge, while showing that not just humans are
social. I'm trying to show that any animals that share information, and are
taught meaning associated with means of communication(Sound in my example,
but I guess it doesn't have to be so narrow. I just thought it was a good
place to start) could be called social.

I don't like the idea that humans are all that special. We're all animals
too.

-Gene