The last big similarity between ant society and human society is that with the development of society, the increase of "elderly" and the emergence of the advantages of the elderly.
In human society, some traditional societies treat the elderly very cruelly, while others are extremely respectful of the elderly and the wise. In terms of these two extremes, most primitive societies tend to favor the former.
The traditional societies of primitive tribes often abandon the care of the elderly. One reason is that in some communities, elderly parents are abandoned or killed because they become a burden and endanger the safety of the entire community. For example, hunting and gathering communities with no fixed settlements must frequently move camps, carrying everything on their backs: babies, children under 4 years old who cannot keep up with adults, weapons, tools, etc., as well as food and water needed for the journey. If you have to carry the elderly or sick people on your back, it will be really difficult to move.
Another reason is environmental, especially arctic or desert areas. Because food was often in short supply and there was no surplus, it was impossible to feed everyone. At this time, the community has to sacrifice the least productive or useless people, otherwise the survival of the entire community will be threatened.
Old people who become a burden to the community will be abandoned. The first approach is the most passive approach, which is to deliberately neglect and let them fend for themselves. For example, giving them very little food, letting them starve, and leaving them to die even if they stray. Such as the Hopi people in the deserts of North America, the Vitoto people in the tropics of South America and the Australian Aboriginals.
The second practice is to deliberately leave the elderly and sick behind when tribesmen move camps. The Bushmen, who are engaged in fishing and hunting, often move from one place to another for hunting. At this time, they usually abandon their elderly relatives, leaving only a piece of meat and some water for these old people.
The third approach is to let the elderly commit suicide. As opposed to committing suicide on your own, the fourth approach is to assist in suicide, or to strangle, stab or bury alive the person who wishes to commit suicide with their cooperation. For example, the Japanese movie "Narayama Setkao" records a cruel tradition: a seventy-year-old man must be sent to the mountain by his son to wait for death! In the Eskimo tribe, people often give the elderly "old people" a sled and let them slide deep into the icy snowfields.
The fifth method is very common, which is to brutally kill the elderly regardless of their wishes.
However, in traditional communities of primitive tribes, the elderly still play a very important role. And with the development of productivity, when more members can be supported, the role of the elders to the entire tribe gradually exceeds its own consumption.
Where the elderly can play a role, although young people can also do it, it is mainly the expertise of the elderly, especially skills that require years of experience, so they are particularly suitable for the elderly.
The elderly can provide food for their grandchildren and reduce their burden on their children, sons-in-law or daughters-in-law. One of the main reasons why Samoan elders immigrate to the United States today is to take care of their grandchildren, so that their children can work away from home and help them reduce the burden of childcare and housework.
Elders can also make things that their adult children need to use, such as tools, weapons, baskets, jars, or textiles.
Older adults have many social advantages because they build networks throughout their lives. They can use their rich network resources to help their children.
The most important function of the elderly in traditional communities is to preserve knowledge. Obviously, in a society without writing, the memory of the elderly contributes to the survival of the tribe. The knowledge and experience possessed by the elders are often the key to the survival of the tribe.
With the emergence of settlement and agriculture, the custom of "abandoning the elderly" in primitive society gradually changed to the custom of "respecting the elderly". The reason is that agricultural production activities are highly cyclical and are greatly affected by climate and solar terms, which depends on the experience of producers. And older people, especially the elderly, naturally have more production experience. Traditional agriculture often realizes the transmission of farming techniques and experience through "oral transmission from father to son and hand-to-hand teaching", thereby improving the status of the elderly in social production and politics.
It can be said that if a civilization wants to transform from infants to children, it must have elders to pass on experience and knowledge. This is the so-called "elderly" advantage.
Tribes with more elders may not have as much food surplus as those tribes composed entirely of young adults, but they have more advantages in raising and educating children, and handling internal conflicts, and have better development prospects.
The same is true in ant society, but the "elderly" here still only refers to the male and female ants of the ruling class, and does not include working ants.
It turns out that the life of male ants in the ant world is very short. Male ants of many races will die after the marriage flight, and only a few will survive with the queen.
Although queen ants live longer, the number of queen ants is very small, and it is difficult for them to shoulder the important task of completely passing on the knowledge and experience of civilization.
Until some time ago, the male ants began to no longer die after mating and flying, nor were they killed and expelled from the nest. They formed a huge class that did not perform physical labor and was only responsible for mental work, similar to those " elder".
It is the existence of a large number of male ants that allows any bit of progressive knowledge in ant society to be preserved and evolve to the current level bit by bit. Therefore, in most advanced ant races, male ants have become the ruling class. In some cases, male and female ants co-operate. Only in a small number of relatively primitive tribes does the queen ant occupy a dominant position.
The protagonist has never compared the similarities and differences between ants and human society so carefully before. Only after living in this world for two years, accumulating a large amount of observation data and grasping the rules, only on this lonely winter day does he not have to worry about all kinds of things. After being overwhelmed by complicated and trivial matters, and having a precious opportunity to think deeply, the protagonist finally grasped the clues.
The races on both sides of the river have clearly reached the dawn of civilization, and the countries in the upper reaches of the river represented by the Big-headed Ant survivors have even more advanced civilizations and are on the eve of becoming a real country.
So, is there still a more advanced ant civilization in this world?
After all, even outside the highly developed human society of the 21st century, outside the sight of most civilized countries, there are still indigenous people in the primitive stage of ignorance in the Amazon, in the Arctic Circle, and in the Andaman Islands in the Indian Ocean. .
Ants are small in size and have weak ability to overcome natural obstacles, making them more prone to extreme imbalances in development!
The protagonist suddenly wants to see this vast world like never before!
