The Road Best Traveled: A Tale of Ants, Slime Mold and the New Jersey Turnpike

[@AV1461]

"I'm late for work, but wait.. I have to sit here and make myself as brige for others to go through." This is just an unkind joke, but it reveals what I believe to be a strong diference between the two examples, humans vs ants. We are driven by self interest, which, like Adam Smith argued in macroeconomics, is capable of great optimization. So some solutions just aren't "fair". But if, for instance, self driven cars were to optimize traffic by sacrificing some of the owners self interest (that agrees to that before hand) in favour of "greater good", then I bealive it would work. The trick, seems to me, lies in the fact that in such a case there is a 'desychronization', if you will, of the agreement to yield to another and the actual action of doing so, that in turn is executed by the car and not the driver. Only in such case would a loss of self interest not be followd by a "Arrrgghh.. you son of a..", because the yield was objectified in a fair way.

[@latrellaquino2686]

I wonder if we can genetically modify slime mold to be useful for teslaphoresic circuits. That would be amazing.

[@LetBBB6345789]

If our cars could easily move to either direction, drive over one another, accelerate and stop instantly not minding to bump into each other, we could move the same way ants do....

[@PattPlays]

A 50/50 ratio of facilitative comments to nonsense comments XD

[@RyanGuill]

A great educational video that ruined it with the poke a Christie at the end. Even if you're right, its at least off topic for this video don't you think?

[@MrMicronano]

+Ryan Guill And the fact he was completely cleared

[@CurtHowland]

The correct question to ask is, "Why are GOVERNMENT roads so bad?" The answer is that it is a failure of central planning, the very thing repeatedly pointed out in this video: Neither ants, nor slime molds, have central planners. This is why capitalism works so well: Capitalism is based on individual ownership of the means of production. Individuals, each acting in what they see as their own best interests, produce what works for them and consume what they want and can afford. More successful endeavors have higher profits, which signal (like pheromones) to others that they can make profits doing that endeavor _better_. Losses mean people leave unproductive, unprofitable endeavors, exactly the way slime molds "seek" better food sources because the better food source is more "profitable".

[@JNCressey]

The ants aren't acting in their individual best interests, they're obeying the collection of pheromones. Every ant that uses the bridge uses its pheromones to influence the bridge. They all publicly own it. No individual ownership.

[@seanisawesome000]

I don't think it is that the slime mold does not have a brain,I think it is a brain itself.

[@RickDeckardMemories]

French like cheese. They also surrender a lot.

[@CMZneu]

background music is too loud or annoying.