Of everything that we know in the universe, our own brain is the most surprising thing. And the most paradoxical thing is that the one hundred billion neurons allow us to compose the Ninth Symphony and know well what happens in a distant galaxy, but not what happens in the brain itself. A humorist said that the brain was his second favorite organ, although he used it much less. But what is not funny, although it is true, is that the brain is like an onion.
Over millions of years, that organ has been forming layer upon layer, from the most primitive to the most sophisticated. That is why in our behaviors we drag the memory of the brain of earthworms and snakes, of chickens and rats, to name only a few congeners. This data is not very funny for some humans who boast of alleged extraterrestrial origins, and prefer not to think about it. And the other species are ashamed to be relatives, even distant, from us humans.
But there are, among the millions of animals, one that looks a lot like us. They are the ants. In a natural state, the worst enemies of ants are the ants themselves, the same as us humans, who are our worst danger. This happens every day in the Amazon jungle and it looks like a horror movie. A river of red ants, in an uncontrollable march, obeying mysterious orders, in one fell swoop, throws itself against an anthill of a similar species, and upon entering they decapitate all the adult ants in a blood bath that would like more than one leader world.
They then rob the larvae and take them to their anthill. At birth, the new offspring will be their slaves and get all the food for them. These ants are born, live and die slaves. Already, with such an army of peaceful workers, the attacking ants become friendly. It is enough that they work for them, like ants, the rest of their lives. In the Sahara there is a species whose queen, after being fertilized, approaches another enemy anthill, and they take it inside, as a hostage.
There, the mysterious prisoner climbs on the owner queen, cuts her head, and begins to lay her own eggs that are protected and raised by the invaded ants. In the end, the population of the invaders prevails and of the crimes there is no memory left. When we look at the history of many peoples, the resemblance is evident. And there are those who doubt the brain of ants that humans have.
In chess, too, being invaded is expensive.
