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Ants are so much like human beings as to be an embarrassment. They farm fungi, raise aphids as livestock, launch armies into war, use chemical sprays to alarm and confuse enemies, capture slaves, engage in child labour, exchange information ceaselessly. They do everything but watch television.

I won't compare ants and people, but ants give us a useful model of how single members of a community can become so organized that they end up resembling, in effect, one big collective brain. Our own exploding population and communication technology are leading us that way.

Ants have the most complicated social organization on earth next to humans.

Ants are the dominant insects of the world, and they've had a great impact on habitats almost all over the land surface of the world for more than 50-million years.

And they discovered something very interesting: when it comes to walking, most of the ant's thinking and decision-making is not in its brain at all. It's distributed. It's in its legs.

Ants are good citizens, they place group interests first.

We are closer to the ants than to the butterflies. Very few people can endure much leisure.

Ants can live together in solidarity and forget themselves in the community. In a normative capitalist society, everyone is an egoist. In the ants' civilization, you are part of the group; you don't live for yourself alone.

I grew up in airports and on air bases. I know what flying and airports can be. And most airports make me feel like we're about three per cent better than ants. Especially U.S. airports. They're zoos. All civility is gone.

I am mad for nature writing. I want to get inside the head of every creature in the world, even ants.