Many people crush ants on the ground while walking and underestimate the power of tiny creatures, but they have the potential to dominate over you.
Can Ants Take Over the World? Ants can take over the world if they get equal in size and brain power to humans. They can do this due to their quick growth rate, stronger bodies, adaptive and learning capabilities, defensive strategies, unity, and increased population.
Ants are known to live on Earth for more than 50 million years; that is only possible due to adaptation as they developed strategies to live with humans and other creatures.
These insects have brought significant changes in their diet and become ecologically dominant species by playing their role in food chains and the environment.
How Can ants take over the world?
Ants can take over the planet earth if all species unite and work on the same goal of excluding other populations on the planet.
Increased population
There are thousands of ant species worldwide, and a few hundred are still unknown. According to a rough estimate, the total population of ants is 20 quadrillion.
In contrast, humans are only 7 to 8 billion in number, which is considered smaller than ants. Almost 2 to 2.5 million ants are there for each human on the planet.
The quick reproduction and growth rate brings extreme variation in their populations because they need only a few days to reach maturity, while humans get mature in several years.
Their eggs turn into adults within a short time as their lifecycle is not too long. Moreover, the queens can lay hundreds of eggs in a day that can become mature babies within 15 to 24 days.
However, larger animals and humans take more time to produce babies and live for many years, as their average lifespan is around 65 to 70 years.
So, you can see these tiny creatures roaming everywhere even if there are no humans or larger animals are seen there.
Ability to learn and adapt
They are smart enough to learn from their past experiences and store information in their brain. They can remember routes for 2 to 3 days to help them return home.
It begins to fade over time but never gets completely lost. Moreover, you can also train them with conditioning trials by giving them food as a reward.
These are one of the oldest creatures on Earth and evolved themselves with time to ensure survival. They have adapted their lifestyle to the changing environment as dietary habits change.
Furthermore, they begin to live close to humans inside buildings providing food, moisture, and suitable spots to hide and reproduce.
So, they are supposed to adapt without humans and other creatures and look for additional resources to fulfill their nutritional requirements, but it takes time.
Physical strength
Ants have smaller bodies and look like tiny creatures, making you believe they do not have enough power. However, their lighter bodies make them strong enough to hold heavy objects.
They are stronger than humans and are supposed to lift a human by considering their power to carry a load 40 to 50 times their body weight.
Humans are heavy with two legs, while these insects have six legs or sticky feet and are lighter, making their movements stable on the ground.
There is less force of gravity on tiny bodies, providing enough power to lift the maximum weight.
Moreover, their physical strength allows them to dominate over other living creatures as they can kill larger organisms with collective efforts of stinging.
Organization of colonies
Ant colonies coordinate to perform activities of food collection and fighting with predators. Unity is present in these insects, which makes them strong enough to deal with challenges.
They have developed unique defensive strategies and mechanisms to detect a threat in their surroundings. In addition, the production of pheromones and chemical sensing helps bring amazing organization.
Moreover, after detecting threats to their survival, they begin to call other fellow ants and kill predators by stinging their bodies collectively.
Therefore, it is not difficult for these tiny creatures to rule over humans if they all work on a common goal to dominate other species on the planet.
Why would ants take over the world?
Most species of ants are territorial and do not tolerate interference in their nests. As a result, humans are known as the predators of these tiny insects that crush thousands of ants underfoot each day.
This massive killing gives rise to their anger and revenge to wipe out the population of humans from the planet and take control of it.
Moreover, invasive species are harmful to humans and animals as deadly stings of these tiny creatures can kill larger animals.
However, these insects do not bother the presence of humans until they are not responsible for causing potential harm to their population.
All organisms on the planet are involved in a symbiotic relationship as they depend on each other for survival. For example, ants are food for other species, and their absence leaves a gap in the food chain.
In the same way, these insects depend on humans as they eat manmade food like baked items, jams, sugar syrups, etc., in addition to natural sources like honey and fruits.
Additionally, the absence of humans leads to decreased number of trees and buildings that provide a nesting spot to these insects as they like to live close to the roots and underground areas.
What stops ants from taking over the world?
They can take over the world if their intelligence level is better than humans. However, they cannot think and make unique decisions because they only follow pheromones to perform a function.
Moreover, they are well aware of functions by birth and perform a typical role in the colony according to their castes, which reduces the possibility of changes in their behavior.
All species have different behavior and abilities, as only a few species are deadly for humans, while others lack stinging capabilities and are harmful.
They have a smaller size and lower weight, making them weaker than humans, as they can easily crush many insects by pressing them under their feet.
These insects can only win the battle and dominate the world if they become equal to or even half the size of humans.
Furthermore, there is no loyalty among different species of ants as they keep fighting with each other to invade the territories and steal their food.
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