I can say, if I like, that social insects behave like the working parts of an immense central nervous system: the termite colony is an enormous brain on millions of legs; the individual termite is a mobile neurone.
Interpretation
The quote likens a termite colony to a vast nervous system, emphasizing the interconnectedness and collective function of its individual members.
In this quote, Lewis Thomas draws an intriguing parallel between the functioning of social insects, particularly termites, and the human brain's neural network. By describing the colony as an 'enormous brain on millions of legs,' he highlights the intricate organization and cooperation among termites, suggesting that each individual termite acts as a neuron, contributing to a greater collective intelligence, much like how neurons in a brain work together to facilitate thought, action, and coordination within an organism.
In practice
In a lecture about ecosystems, this quote could illustrate the organization of social insects.
I suggest that the introductory courses in science, at all levels from grade school through college, be radically revised. Leave the fundamentals, the so-called basics, aside for a while, and concentrate the attention of all students on the things that are not known.
I maintain, despite the moment's evidence against the claim, that we are born and grow up with a fondness for each other, and we have genes for that. We can be talked out of it, for the genetic message is like a distant music, and some of us are hard-of-hearing. Societies are noisy affairs, drowning out the sound of ourselves and our connection.
Science is founded on uncertainty. Each time we learn something new and surprising, the astonishment comes with the realization that we were wrong before.
It is the very strangeness of nature that makes science engrossing. That ought to be at the center of science teaching. There are more than seven-times-seven types of ambiguity in science, awaiting analysis. The poetry of Wallace Stevens is crystal-clear alongside the genetic code.
In the fields I know best, among the life sciences, it is required that the most expert and sophisticated minds be capable of changing course - often with a great lurch - every few years.
The earliest sensation at the onset of illness, often preceding the recognition of identifiable symptoms, is apprehension. Something has gone wrong, and a glimpse of mortality shifts somewhere deep in the mind. It is the most ancient of our fears.
If nature has made you for a giver, your hands are born open, and so is your heart; and though there may be times when your hands are empty, your heart is always full, and you can give things out of that--warm things, kind things, sweet things--help and comfort and laughter--and sometimes gay, kind laughter is the best help of all.
Oh, this is the joy of the rose;_x000D_ _x000D_ That it blows,_x000D_ _x000D_ And goes.
One day's exposure to mountains is better than a cartload of books.
We travel together, passengers on a little spaceship, dependent on its vulnerable reserves of air and soil, all committed, for our safety, to its security and peace. Preserved from annihilation only by the care, the work and the love we give our fragile craft.
A little child paddles a little boat, Drifting about, and picking white lotuses. He does not know how to hide his tracks, And duckweed's opened up along his path.
One thing I did was grow up as an ardent naturalist. I never grew out of my bug period.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.