The Insane Biology of: Slime Mold

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Instagram: / stephaniesammann
Credits:
Narrator: Stephanie Sammann
Writer: Ashleen Knutsen
Editor: Dylan Hennessy (www.behance.net/dylanhennessy1)
Editor: Leany Muñoz
Illustrator: Jacek Ambrożewski
Illustrator/Animator: Kirtan Patel (kpatart.com/illustrations)
Animator: Mike Ridolfi (www.moboxgraphics.com/)
Sound: Graham Haerther (haerther.net)
Thumbnail: Simon Buckmaster ( / forgottentowel )
Producer: Brian McManus ( / realengineering )
Imagery courtesy of Getty Images
REFERENCES:
[1] arxiv.org/pdf/2103.00172.pdf
[2] bio.libretexts.org/Bookshelve...
[3] www.nps.gov/articles/000/slim...
[4] pediaa.com/difference-between...
[5] bio.libretexts.org/Bookshelve...
[6] • Dictyostelium - a Cell...
[7] www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas...
[8] www.sciencedirect.com/topics/...
[9] www.nps.gov/articles/000/slim...
[10] arxiv.org/pdf/2103.00172.pdf
[11] www.nature.com/articles/35035...
[12] annealing-cloud.com/en/knowle...
[13] www.jstor.org/stable/40508592
[14] royalsocietypublishing.org/do...
[15] www.sciencedirect.com/science...
[16] www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/arti...
[17] www.researchgate.net/publicat...

[@DOom-gw8sk]

And everybody keeps wondering how artificial intelligence is going to take over when it doesn't actually have a brain. It doesn't need a brain it's going to use slime molds all hail the slime mold Overlord

[@the_armada5579]

All hail the slime mold Overlord!

[@ashleelarsen2233]

Cyanobacteria be jelly

[@polymathpark]

​@@ashleelarsen2233literally!

[@newnickfb]

Slime molds have millions and millions of years of evolution that AI doesn’t have, and AI cant even power itself.

[@pyropulseIXXI]

AI will never take over; that is just AI doomsayers talking nonsense

[@philip_waldman]

Very minor correction at 13:00: TSP doesn't just take exponential time, it is factorial time. Which grows even faster than exponential.

[@Scam_Likely.]

Glad someone else caught that

[@desmond-hawkins]

Very minor correction: NP-complete algorithms known today require _superpolynomial_ time for the optimal solution, which is in fact exponential but exponential in O(N^k) for a value of k > 0. A regular exponential would be e^(k × N) for example, whereas these look like e^(N^k). A more important correction is that they are comparing optimal solutions to slime mold's approximations. We have tons of algorithms for NP-hard problems that give great approximations of the optimal solution much more efficiently, e.g. simulated annealing is around O(log(N)) - ref: "SU-CIS-92-12".

[@zakariferguson2155]

I love comments that introduce me to concepts I've never heard of

[@d3line]

Factorial time is only for the most naive "check all possible graphs" algorithm. Our best exact solution algorithms are exponential.

[@suheilpinto6964]

Really you are taking this video seriously. Almost every thing about it is nonsense.

[@benmcreynolds8581]

I love this so much. This is basically a biological analog computer. It utilizes it's senses and boils things down to a {Yes or a No}. So they are surprisingly good at what they need to do.

[@kami_1789]

So it thinks in binary. Also, analog computer?

[@ok-tr1nw]

@@kami_1789 analog as in it technically physically doesnt operate on a fixed binary signal but a wave like one

[@flamencoprof]

Yes or No is clearly a binary decision. This is clearly not a binary organism. I suspect you have got too familiar with the terms of binary computation and forgot they don't apply to analogue systems.

[@XSR_RUGGER]

@@flamencoprof they did say "boils down to" which I would take that as there are more decisions and computation but in the end they make it a simple of yes or no decision. I don't think it's a simple yes or know because they are only looking for food and they want to do it economically while staying away from danger. I'm a lay person on this subject though so take that for what you will.

[@flamencoprof]

@@XSR_RUGGER Some things just do not have a Yes or No character ("Is it a tree or a shrub?"", "Is she a real Jew?", "Is it a planet or not?", "Is he normal?"). no matter how much someone may wish to boil them down. That's the way I understand it anyway, even though that is itself a binary statement, hah! 🙂

[@locdawg3815]

Japan used slime molds to redo their transportation system in Tokyo which was an amazing feat. Saw it first hand and these slime molds are so intelligent that they find the fastest route to and from connected locations even if it's just for experimentation purposes.

[@FLPhotoCatcher]

It seems fitting that Japan uses Slime mold tentacles for things.

[@shivamthakur1176]

@@FLPhotoCatcher😂😂😂

[@Monsieurlemon2]

@@FLPhotoCatchereugh

[@tristarperfecta1061]

That is amazing and this comment just gave me some big ideas.

[@AreUmygrandson]

I remember hearing about slime mold as a child and always wanted to know more. I had behavioral issues though so not many teachers would answer my questions

[@mattchagnon5620]

That is terrible, sorry to hear that. Now you can learn all you want though.

[@tristarperfecta1061]

​@mattchagnon5620 don't be sorry. They went through what they went through so their curiosity to learn would become amplified years later. It happened for me like that.

[@benmcreynolds8581]

Now I have this image in my head: Where the higher up workers for UPS show up for their shift. They go over the daily slime mold array before sending out their instructions to their delivery driver's lol 😆 Man I really hope someone makes a skit similar to this. If done right, the sarcasm & science is there for a really clever skit.

[@arktv6093]

You do it

[@someguy2135]

Better yet, the UPS driver checks in with his boss, who happens to be a slime mold. I could picture Saturday Night Live doing that one if a headline got enough attention.

[@gaoxiaen1]

I used to work for UPS. I was treated as well as a slime mold, except that slime molds don't have to work under such temperature extremes and high stress. That being said, UPS workers had better medical care than slime molds.

[@ImeldaFagin]

A skit??! My boss IS a slime mold and likes to micro manage. Now I understand why.

[@garrettmoore5114]

Il work for slime in future… makin 110k a year as driver

[@charliem5254]

The more I observe nature the more I realize intelligence is not brain dependent.

[@sunilkumaryadav2183]

Nature has every answer

[@honeycrispTV]

let us take a moment to remember our boy Scarecrow from Wizard of Oz. the guy had no brain, but could walk, talk, sing and dance.

[@BMohantyone]

both are a very different kind of intelligence

[@pyropulseIXXI]

Even in humans, it seems intelligence and memory is dispersed throughout the body. There are abnormalities of certain humans that basically had 99% of their head space just spinal/brain fluid, with a small brain layer near the skull. Yet their IQ was upwards of 125, and had no detectable adverse effects but had the performance and memory of a higher IQ individual. There have been reports of being getting an organ transplant and their favorite food switches to the favorite food of the organ donor. Or if they really liked basketball, the donee becomes a basketball fanatic

[@charliem5254]

@@pyropulseIXXI very true

[@desmond-hawkins]

(13:00) Slime mold doesn't magically compute solutions in linear time while computers do it in exponential time. The very high cost of algorithms used to solve problems like the Traveling Salesman is only to find the absolute best path, the most optimal. Slime mold can probably find amazing solutions, but it's not trying to find the best since the cost of doing that would require a huge amount of time and energy. Just like slime mold, computer scientists have devised algorithms to find great approximations of the optimal solutions to these hard problems (called NP-hard). Some are in fact much more efficient than slime mold's "linear time" approach, with O(log(N)) for simulated annealing for example - a classic approach to the Traveling Salesman.

[@ananjayram761]

True

[@marcopivetta7796]

The difference is we do have the resources to spend the extra time and energy to think of the best possible pathway, so that then we can find the most efficient solution that also is as close as the optimal solution as possible.

[@desmond-hawkins]

@@marcopivetta7796 One advantage of these algorithms is that you can choose how much to spend on the computation, with the understanding that the earlier steps get you a lot closer to the optimum than later ones, where each step usually only brings much smaller improvements than at the start. Being able to control this expenditure is a major advantage when choosing how to solve a problem. For anyone getting into coding: implementing such algorithms is a great exercise for anyone studying computer science, and they are used all the time to approach problems where finding the best solution is impossibly expensive computationally. Traveling salesman with simulated annealing is a real classic.

[@metonoma]

latent multiverse time-traveling slimesmen

[@alexcarter8807]

I kept flunking out of 2nd semester calculus, but if you give me a scale map of the territory and some screw-eyes and a piece of string, I can probably come up with a pretty good solution.

[@miketacos9034]

This is crazy, but also a good explanation of how AI could be intelligent without being conscious.

[@KaizokuSencho]

It also questions the whole idea of consciousness, we are nothing but organic computers, why are our 'counciousness' more valid than AI? Or do you believe in an immortal soul?

[@dojisan5050]

HOw do you know the slim molds are not conscious? :)

[@JonahRoyes]

​@@dojisan5050indeed what if they share some sort of hive mind

[@JonahRoyes]

​@@dojisan5050where each cell basically acts like a single nueron, can't do much on it's own but put a bunch of them together and you have a brain

[@Rhannmah]

@@dojisan5050 I don't think a slime mold has an internal representation of itself and the world in which it resides.

[@Jmjmjmjmjmjmjmjmjmjmjm1]

Slime molds make better decisions than me. 😂

[@EvolutionisUniversi]

Slime is consciousnes. consciousness 1.the state of being aware of and responsive to one's surroundings. "she failed to regain consciousness and died two days later" Similar: awareness, wakefulness, alertness, responsiveness, sentience. Opposite: unconsciousness 2. a person's awareness or perception of something. The more you sense the more alive you are.

[@GeoffryGifari]

the CG in the venom movies got to be at least partially inspired by these things

[@zompat7677]

Pssst....🤫

[@daniell1483]

I love the idea of a biological computer chip. Biomechanical constructs have been a staple of speculative fiction for a long time, and I can't help but see this slime mold chip as something of a first step in that direction. To use a gaming term, it is like we are discovering a brand new tech tree. I have no idea how feasible this technology will be in the face of our incoming AI overlords, but I'm looking forward to finding out.

[@dahmc59]

ET has been utilizing this for thousands of years...

[@runsk88]

a first step towards the direction of fiction

[@crystaldragon471]

I'm calling the slime mold rights activists. And don't be surprised if the slime mold mother ship shows up to destroy all humans.

[@daniell1483]

@@crystaldragon471 I honestly wouldn't be surprised to find out this is actually an alien life form. People think we have the tree of life figured out, but we don't. There's an entire group of organisms that we can't classify them so we just lump them together as protists. Crazy to think we are just now figuring this out.

[@AD-lh3jk]

@@dahmc59 what’s ET?

[@andrewreynolds912]

The way this slime works is nuts and amazing and so sci fi! Well done!

[@Jasmime_jazzy]

personally, I LOVE this video it teaches me so much I am currently homeschooled and I'm 12 and my mom asked me what kind of project I wanted to do and I picked mold fungi ECT There was so much I didn't know and now I think this type of stuff is fun. Please keep making videos like this I'm sure people would love them!😁😁

[@robinbeavan5152]

I have slime mould on my lawn feeding on grass cuttings. I noticed it a few years ago in autumn. At first I thought it was cat sick but under closer examination it had a form and grew slowly also spreading then disappearing when it gets colder. I look out for it now as I quite like it.

[@thelittlehooer]

Using slime moulds in the Toyko rail network reminds me of the giant model of the San Francisco bay used to demonstrate the location and strength of currents in the real bay. It was in the Alcatraz escape episode of Mythbusters, I think. A purely analogue simulation of something too complex to simulate digitally.

[@kuri369kuri]

Outstanding video. I’m amazed at how utterly intelligent slime mold is

[@Akash.Chopra]

You have taught me so much through this channel. Thank you for all your hard work!

[@charlessarver1637]

This one's my favorite

[@GameTobenetois]

The idea of slime molds solving the complex exponecial tasks lineraly, really reminds one of quantom computing It brings to the front the idea that organisms are natural quantom computers capable of compound computation, even on the smallest of scales (the whole idea of microtubuli) If that's the case, than computer parts using slime molds are essencially the most efficient quantom computers that humanity has made so far

[@deitachan7878]

Life has had billions of years to optimize the fuck out of everything, it is extremely complex but incredibly resource, energy and iteration efficient. Computers have the luxury of not needing to be concerned with the resources they are made of, they do not need to worry about maintaining their survival, constructing themselves, nor finding energy or using it efficiently and furthermore are not limited by the maximum heat of organic material. They can also be sloppy and do things over many iterations because theres lots of data to train off of. Even with all these advantages its performance is... not great.

[@pyropulseIXXI]

@@deitachan7878 The fact it solves exponential tasks in linear time means it is beyond just simple computation. It is literally just basic physics. It doesn't matter how long something evolves for; it cannot beat exponential time with normal computing methods. And yet a slime mold can beat this

[@deitachan7878]

@@pyropulseIXXI All biological live does analog (and potentially) quantum calculations which are far more powerful than regular digital calculation but also more complicated to do, taking advantage of physics to self optimize itself.

[@d3line]

​@@pyropulseIXXI It doesn't solve the problem, it estimates a solution. Solving traveling salesman problem exactly is exponential, but we have plenty of estimation algorithms that ran faster at the cost of sometimes giving suboptimal results. Mold can't compete with computers in real time, it grows at few cm per hour in the best case. And I bet the quality of the mold-estimation decreases rapidly as the number of towns (and consequently the distance between them) increases. It uses molecular signalling, so the communication range is limited by the amount of produced molecules (which is obviously finite). The longer the mold the less globaly-optimal the solution.

[@pyropulseIXXI]

​@@deitachan7878 If you understood my comment, you would've realized what I was saying is that biological life uses quantum calculations instead of classical calculations. I am not aware of any classical computations done by biological life; the brain isn't like a digital computer at all and works in an entirely different manner. There is no 'logic gates' or 'adders' or 'xor gates,' etc. If you give me an example of biological classical computation, I'd just reckon it is a quantum calculation that ran an algorithm to output what looks like a classical computation Therefore, biological computations are always more efficient than our digital computers. When I throw a ball to hit a moving target, I am not doing explicit calculations for this, and the brain isn't either, despite what oafs would say. Also, depth doesn't require the distance between the eyes, but people say it does and the brain 'calculate .' WRONG. You can see depth with one eye. People say you hear the direction of something by the time difference between the two ears and the brain 'calculates.' WRONG. You can hear the direction of something with one ear. People always default to this stupid analogy and think the analogy is real; the brain does not do calculations like this; the entire hypothesis falls apart when you only need one of the thing they claim you need two of to do the calculation. It is stuff like this that people claim is 'biology doing classical computations,' but it is just so wrong as to be laughable, yet people repeat it as fact despite it being so easy to debunk and disprove Even estimating how much time has passed isn't done via a calculation in the brain (otherwise it would be near exact); it is instead done by pure intuition, which is beyond mere 'calculation.' Humans don't even do arithmetic via calculation, and that is the quintessential easiest calculation to do; hence, the brain does not calculate, ever. It arrives at 'answers' via other means. I could tell you what is really going on, but it is more advanced than even quantum calculations, so many people have a hard time understanding it

[@terezaslancikova3111]

OMG i'm so happy and thanful you did this, i learned about these last semester in my plants phylogenetic class and i wanted to know more, but i wasn't able to find any good articles or videos about it and I wanted to know EVERYTHING! the slime mold is so mindblowing to me.. thank you thank you

[@oak7700]

Maybe I should start growing mold on my computer to make it more efficient 😂

[@saradhasekar9670]

🤣

[@joshua.h]

Correction, growing mold IN your computer. What could possibly go wrong?

[@phelan8385]

You're joking but I bet in the coming decades we'll find ways to use fungi/slime molds to improve technology like your pc.

[@charlessarver1637]

Yeah just spill a milkshake on it and don't clean it up

[@TheCycloneTrooper]

You'll need that overclocking soda spill from time to time

[@howwitty]

The goal of the slime mold in optimizing resources differs from our sociological death drive for prestige optimization in that we aspire to improve prestige at the potential cost of our physiological and intellectual viability.

[@themonsterbaby]

11:44 that is absolutely amazing. We could literally use this organism in future city planning and logistics.

[@thatguywiththestache]

this is the single wildest video I have ever watched.

[@BraidinPurdy]

The insane biology of series is one my favourite series on this platform

[@blademasterzero]

Pretty crazy how these things are the real world equivalent of fantasy slimes

[@robert10197]

This channel consistent blows my mind. Every video is engaging and brilliantly made.

[@baraskparas9559]

Fantastic presentation of an interesting subject.

[@nubletten]

Slime molds share some similar traits with a quantum computer considering the pathways it chooses.

[@stijnfrima6559]

Thank you for this beautiful explanation, I definitely learned something i didn't know!

[@finnaginfrost6297]

I love the content and the research. If I may provide feedback, the faux camera shake (4:13, 4:55 etc) isn't really to my taste, I feel it disrupts the well-designed imagery. However, I understand how appealing it is to closely simulate microscope footage, and I'm quite happy with the video.

[@YoungGandalf2325]

The next world war will be fought between AI robots and slime molds.

[@hammad8255]

@YoungGandalf2325 i don't think so because slim molds and AI both lacks the ability to conquer humanity slim molds never tried to conquer human like wise AI will never be able to conquer humanity

[@dravendragoor1457]

Fascinating, as always. Happy I found your channel in the wild sea of the KZbins :)

[@Ratciclefan]

I've already heard of them by now but it's still cool hearing about them

[@surfinmuso37]

There is nothing "random" about nature. It's clear there is intelligence and decision making at all levels. Personally I believe the theory of evolution needs a massive overhaul, in particular the whole notion of random mutation needs to be scrapped entirely. Nature is far too elegant, efficient and obviously exceedingly intelligent to rely on a random process to be responsible for creation. This is what scientist Barbara McClintock discovered way back in the 50's. She won a Nobel Prize for her discoveries that took decades to be accepted because they flew in the face of conventional scientific understanding. She was actually far ahead of her time and back then her work obviously offended the stubborn patriarchal nature of the establishment. She was basically ostracised and subsequently awarded for her brilliant work.

[@matthewhydro4753]

Calling it 'creation' is fallacious. Its begging the question. There is no evidence of any sort of intelligence behind nature. All the evidence we have supports evolution by natural selection.

[@LM-yn5xq]

Beautiful explanation ❤

[@aidanwoodward3975]

Nature goes with what is good enough. It is the reason medicine exists

[@surfinmuso37]

@@aidanwoodward3975 Interdependent multiplicity!

[@aidanwoodward3975]

@@surfinmuso37 And?

[@gehtdichnixan2499]

Amazing, this is exactly the Kind of organism which Frank schätzing described in his fictional book the swarm 15 years ago, but I believe at this time, slime molds wasn't really discovered. In the book, it is slime mold in the oceans, that kinda beat humanity, great book, and now much more on reality than I ever thougt :)

[@user-go5ri2yg5f]

In a few decades AI is going to use humans like we use slime molds 😂

[@derrickmcadoo3804]

Technically, the wealthiest 0.1% has been doing this exact same thing for centuries. Look at manifest destiny, and the great push West in the US. Slime mold progress.

[@randomkid913]

Only a couple seconds in and the narration is alr amazing, great video, learning whilst keeping it intriguing

[@sathvamp1]

Ohhhh myyy gooodnesss.... no wonder slime molds get skimmed over or even eliminated in biology textbooks, if they are so confusing! When the narrator used the word "shapeshifter" on them... I thought "I want a pet slime mold and I will name it Nimona" :D

[@HopperChopper]

Really fascinating stuff!

[@thundermane362]

I've always wondered how some people can function without using their brains. I guess they're not much different than slime molds

[@gobbledygook99]

Wow. Mind blown. So many possibilities to try now.

[@arefakherwada7281]

i actually knew about this slime mold from a while but still i like ur explanation

[@allo-other]

Anthropomorphism alert. Cellular signaling algorithm.

[@UniDocs_Mahapushpa_Cyavana]

The real question is if organisms can have intelligences without a brain ❌🧠, how intelligent are humans outside of their brain's activity?

[@J-manli]

At the end of the day, it all comes down to how well and how effective a cell can react the stimuli. A slime mold doesn’t need a brain because it doesn’t have need of other organs (ie heart, kidneys, and diaphragm) to automatically run and keep itself functioning.

[@UniDocs_Mahapushpa_Cyavana]

@@J-manli The brain 🧠 is not effective at everything. For example, its high energy 🐳⚡ costs means it is worse for long term problems that can be solved over night or over weeks. Also, it has no way to directly interact with the immune 🏥 system's parts. Which is a big limiting factor.

[@gaoxiaen1]

Not as intelligent as a planaria worm.

[@TorMax9]

Sometimes, I just let go, stop thinking and go with intuition. Works out well always. Thinking has its limitations. Concepts have their limitations. Models have their limitations. The flow of life, energy, efficiency is infinite. There's a wisdom at work deeper than we can imagine, comprehend or capture. And, yet, we are part of it.

[@user-mz8qd5rd9q]

I have a new appreciation for slime mold.

[@pluspiping]

There's brute-forcing a solution path by simply iterating every individual mathematical possibility, and then there's brute-forcing by iterating them all at once. Slime molds made the "1 to 1 scale map" joke work by running the whole thing at once. Love it.

[@GeoffryGifari]

when thousands of cells aggregate and some form a fruiting body, are the cells made to become spores selected randomly? or among all those cells some have traits that guide them to take the role of spores?

[@creativityb2457]

This is still an open question. No one knows answer to this

[@GeoffryGifari]

@@creativityb2457 fascinating!

[@247artsnsourcing6]

Someone outside arranges them in organization. God

[@shashwatsagar5151]

New video me happy

[@Kayaz48]

This was a great video. I even liked the ad at the end!

[@kritikakulshrestha8798]

You my friend are great . And i am deeply inspired by your work. You gained a new subscriber.

[@shyamgaikwad4127]

Im sorry what now??i didn't know something like slime was a natural alive thing and now you are telling me that it can strategize

[@benmcreynolds8581]

It's a form of a unique Fungi. Like how we have lichen, mushrooms, mycelium, mold. It's super facinating

[@TheRedKnight101]

@@benmcreynolds8581 Slime molds are in completely different groups then fungi.

[@d3line]

Every living thing can. You need to be smarter than your food to survive.

[@troyaddy7087]

I have an issue with calling slime moulds intelligent. If you look at what is really happening, it is not planned intelligence like we do for subways. The slime mould goes in every direction and sticks with only the ones that work (give access to food). We can see this same kind of thinking if you have a group of friends that decide to go into a corn maze. Nobody knows where the exit is, so a bunch of the real go getters will go forward and try all the routes available and come back to the group and let them know which paths lead to a dead end. So as the group moves forward, it will follow the most direct path to the exit. We see the same with the slime moulds. The resulting movement is where it can access food and offer the least loss of energy. Nothing about intelligence here. It is the basics of searching for food that it has developed over millions of years. The end result is the most efficient route between food sources, but it tried every possible combination before it got to that point.

[@jameszy88]

My thoughts exactly.

[@BinaryDood]

Yeah, a lot of the "intelligence" comparison seems to stem from forced categorical thinking. Not that intelligence cant be different from just the possession of a brain.

[@nevyngould1744]

Complex problem solving

[@nevyngould1744]

"tried every possible combination" . As do the synapses in the human brain when learning to move and control the body as infants. After which the successful pathways are retained, the others wither.

[@geraldkenneth119]

I kind of reminds me of the A* algorithm

[@katgettingblckdinayellowthong]

Great video! Absolute fascinating 🤯

[@dj_laundry_list]

6:18 Aren't the cells just engaged in a snowdrift game?

[@alliu6562]

Out with AI technology, in with slime mold!

[@LovestruckShorts]

What if it is a brain 🧠

[@trackert3358]

Nearly 3 decades and still have yet to find a slime mold in real life. I've always been super fascinated about them!!

[@markumoeder]

Just imagine a slime-mold humanoid robot that walks,talks and could move like a human with 3d printed limbs and electronic sensor's that could mimic an animal because of its intelligence , a cyborg because it could be even conscious or maybe even have a soul ,so you can't really call it a robot.

[@Roberto-dd1te]

Slime is beating quantum computing even before it goes live!

[@d3line]

Uh-huh. At the speed of growth measured in centimetres per second. Its fun, but it probably can't beat a human with a pen and paper

[@palak22]

Humans are the most intelligent species? Slime molds really make me question all that we have been taught since childhood. Great video as always👍

[@pyropulseIXXI]

Have you seen a slime mold create a mathematical theory or theory of electromagnetism?

[@uberdice]

Sure, if you limit your definition of intelligence to "can I find food very slowly".

[@blobbertmcblob4888]

Intelligence is also relative. It isn't always what we think it is. There are plenty of intelligent species. For example, New Caledonian crows have better problem solving skills than most species of parrots(such as Macaws, which are said to be of about the same intelligence level as a human toddler) and better grasp of tool use than Chimpanzees.

[@leitodamien3835]

@@pyropulseIXXI Not yet, but it will soon enough

[@pyropulseIXXI]

@@blobbertmcblob4888 A human toddler is vastly more intelligent than any animal. They can communicate. Plus, their tool use is vastly superior; you just have to go to 'china' were child labor is a thing, and you can see videos of literal babies working on the factory line doing super repetitive tasks over and over again with some quickness

[@user-wz8fh7hc4d]

I couldn't but find this being the perfect description of the recently-booked facing 91 charges.

[@billygsterling6727]

simply amazing

[@CMZneu]

Look slime molds are pretty neat but this video grossly over exaggerates its coolness to the point it's a bit ridiculous. Slime molds aren't in any way inteligent, they follow a simple set of rules for their pathfinding, and it's similar to what other organisms do, like ants with their trails or mushrooms with mycelium. Slime mold covers the surface with a small layer of it's cell membrane, when one section reaches food it thickens/gows that section because it has access to more nutrients to do so, and just like that it automatically finds an optimal path because the trails that get food more quickly are the ones the get the most food to grow and logically these are the paths that get reinforced. Also they DO NOT remember where they have been, most likely they avoid growing over old chemical cues they themselves previously left behind, probably as these get older and weaker there is less incentive to avoid them. They do seem to have some type of memory of certain stimulus at certain times of day to prepare and brace themselves, for example the harsh rays of the sun in the morning or something like that, but again many non intelligent organisms have this. One more thing haven't looked into the slime mold in computer chip thing thats sounds pretty cool but i'm pretty certain it led nowhere lol.

[@samhodge7460]

Thanks for being one of the few voices of reason in this comment section. People don't seem to understand how following a few simple rules can lead to complex behavior. Look up the "Boids" algorithm for another example.

[@pyropulseIXXI]

The reason it solves it better than us is because it doesn't try to impose its limited conscious experience and just goes naturally. If humans just existed in society without trying to control or impose control on it, it would be far more efficient. It is pure arrogance and naivety to think otherwise

[@watcher1245]

This is actually something that should be receiving a lot of attention and research. A.I. could use this as artificial neuro-pathing.

[@totallynormalhuman4695]

we should sacrifice the earth to the slime mold in selective breeding experiments

[@SuperHansburger93]

TL;DR version: they're not. They don't solve any problems, or at least not in the sense that we think. They do find a solution, but they do so in the same way that pouring water inside a vertical labyrinth will eventually reach the exit. We don't imply that the water is smart because water isn't alive, but it's important to understand that solving a maze by trying all paths at the same time is not a mark of intelligence.

[@ZeLoShady]

It's the optimizing of the final path choice & it's ability to leave markers on already explored areas that makes it intelligent. It took 8 hours to make that Tokyo train map, imagine how many hours of work it took for computer engineers to do that. This is a poor TLDR. You clearly just got mad and stopped paying attention at a certain point.

[@dreamguest3597]

fortnite battle pass

[@UniDocs_Mahapushpa_Cyavana]

How many of our problems are actually solved by human thinking 🤔? I'm pretty most of it is an illusion 🪄 by our subconscious doing the problem instead then feeding some of the information to the conscious mind to deal with *proactivity.* If slime molds don't count, you need to prove what is actually solved by the conscious part of the mind. Not just what it is fed 🧑‍🍼.

[@samhodge7460]

@@ZeLoShady The optimization happens automatically. Paths that cost less energy to transport the same amount of nutrients as neighboring paths will inherently be reinforced since they will have excess energy. This will naturally cause an energy gradient across all paths that eventually leads to a coalescing into the optimal path. There's nothing intelligent about it.

[@d3line]

​@@ZeLoShady "imagine how many hours of work it took for computer engineers to do that". Let's imagine. It's not exactly traveling salesman problem, but close enough, it's in the ballpark. Naive brute force "try everything" solutions are uselessly slow at ~20 cities. Simplest optimisation (branch-and-bound) taught in every university algorithms 101 class works for up to 40-60 cities. So the answer to your question is about an hour to code and maybe an hour to run, the same time the mold took to grow a few centimetres. And that's the optimal solution, good enough approximations could be found muuuuch faster. In reality mold grows in the petri dish, but building infrastructure is much more than "connect the dots". Mold doesn't care about land rights, terrain, existing buildings, noise levels, depot stations, all of the cities besides the 36 largest once, etc, etc, etc.

[@zacharywong483]

Spectacular video, Real Science team!

[@professorx2607]

Just found out something like this existed......oh the shivers....simply unbelievable.😶

[@Hellboy2049]

The ‘Travelling salesman problem’ has the obvious fundamental assumption that there is only ONE salesman , not a team of salesman dispersing across multiple routes to cover many cities and find the shortest path between them. This therefore makes the slime mood analogy redundant , as the salesman problem is one of linear processing and not a concurrent processing one !

[@thegroove2000]

The creation is amazing.

[@Veptis]

Emergent behaviour is really interesting. And I hope we can show some more useful solutions based on artificial agents.

[@eliscanfield3913]

There was an interesting PBS Nova on this a while back. Pretty cool

[@earnestbrown6524]

Totally agree, great program. Episode is called "Secret Mind of Slime."

[@MAElbashir]

That is fascinating. Thanks

[@matthewgray659]

This is incredibly interesting.

[@BluishGreenPro]

I've always had a morbid fascination with Slime Mold, they're the closest things we have in real life to "slimes" in video games

[@colleenverdon6315]

This is amazing!

[@RokStembergar]

Your best video so far!

[@Reach41]

Intelligence is even demonstrated by inanimate object without a neural pathway of any kind. For example, rocks on a hillside sometimes get so bored of the same old view that they voluntarily relocate to better digs down the hill.

[@gordonwallin2368]

Crazy. Cheers from the Pacific West Coast of Canada

[@yoyohortiglance7176]

Simply loved it💓

[@activestyle4324]

This is great, my whole life people have called me a piece of slime.., now I can be proud of it!

[@pashamorozov8257]

it is amazing. I think that computer (digital) artificial intelligence will help to understand the nature of slime mold. more frightening if people manage to curb the nature of this creature, control it - there will be those who want to make a weapon out of this. I mean imagine that you trained a creature to do something bad, and that creature began to multiply and tell its fellows what to do.

[@ejoshcoron]

This channel is all bangers

[@jeremiahellis1566]

Instinctual reactions to outside stimuli require no choices. The prerequisites of Intelligence begins with a sentient awareness with the ability to choose, based on perceived information, with a multitude of variables.

[@kevinnugent6530]

So when one slime mold cell is feeling down, they go for a group hug.

[@csongorszecska]

If they put slime molds in the computer, than the sayings "sorry I have to feed my comuter" and "my cpu died" won't sound so crazy anymore

[@Melissa-ls7zt]

This is amazing 🤯

[@bloodypommelstudios7144]

I'd argue physical networks which grow, self organize, send signals and react to a verity of external stimulus to solve problems ARE brains. In hindsight slime mold's intelligent behavior shouldn't have been very surprising.

[@d3line]

Well, a kubernetes cluster is an artificial brain then. It automatically grows and shrinks depending on the external stimulus, self organizes routing of requests to nearest available nodes, sends plenty of signals every which way and reacts to stimulus real well

[@gaoxiaen1]

That explains Reagan, Clinton, and the two Bushes.

[@jaybingham3711]

Even some worms acculumate in massive numbers and their 'slug' takes on emergent properties. Crazy fascinating.

[@livestrongforever]

this need to be a movie

[@gregmonks]

Intelligence without a brain? You've just described most of humanity.

[@keiths1400]

boy it sure is a good thing we can be confident that there is not a lab somewhere engineering cordyceps to survive at human body temp.

[@luzellemoller6621]

"It doesn't have a brain....like animals" not all animals have brains just brain like stuff...cough jellyfish

[@konstantindiachenko4974]

После просмотра этого видео, идея использовать чайный гриб в качестве советника, не кажется такой уж гротескной 😉

[@SoulbreakerNB]

A copy can't beat the original if that thing isn't a 100% exact copy.

[@missmurrydesign7115]

Respectfully, better than "we can" not "us."

[@nassimabed]

This channel is probably the best about segways to the sponsor message. And I love it.

[@gaoxiaen1]

*segues. Segways are those two-wheeled scooter abominations.

[@nassimabed]

@@gaoxiaen1 👍🏻 thanks for correcting