A fascinating branch of computational intelligence is swarm intelligence — inspired by how simple creatures in nature achieve complex goals together. Individually, these “dumb bugs” perform only basic tasks. Yet collectively they create intricate structures like beehives, hornet nests, and termite mounds. Their coordinated activity gives rise to what’s known as emergent behavior — complex outcomes arising from simple individual actions.

Last Monday’s Micro Softy was about termites. The solution is below. Today’s puzzle is about how bugs can break up fights.

Picture a large swarm of crawling insects, represented by the dots in Figure 1. Each bug eyes two other bugs that he thinks are going to fight. As a peacemaker, he moves to place himself between these two.  Meanwhile, every bug in the swarm eyes two different bugs and does the same thing. Each bug is moving trying to place itself between two other bugs chosen at random.

So the question: What happens to this swarm of bugs in the long run?

Solution to Micro Softy 81: Termites are Surprisingly Smart

Last week’s Micro Softy was also about how complex behavior can emerge from simple rules (emergent behavior).

The puzzle featured a colony of termites surrounded by little pieces of wood. Each termite walks around randomly. If it bumps into a piece of wood, and it’s empty-handed, it picks it up. If it’s carrying a piece of wood and bumps into another piece of wood, it puts the piece of wood it’s carrying down. Every single termite is doing the same thing. If you bump into a piece of wood, you pick it up. Bump into another piece of wood, put it down. What is the emergent behavior? What happens to all of the pieces of wood?

Case 1: First of all, what happens when the termite moves randomly at each step?

The answer is that over time, the scattered pieces of wood start to cluster together, forming piles. This is shown in Figure 2:

Case 2: This scenario is the same as in Case 1 except for the termites’ movement at each step. Instead of only a random move, each termite first takes a tiny step to the northeast and then takes a random step. What is the emergent behavior in this case?

The answer is shown in Figure 3. The wood is red and the open paths are blue. The circles are carrying wood. The dots are not. And the answer is: the termites build tunnels to travel northeast.

Here is a video of the termites in action for both cases:

The Monday Micro Softy is a weekly feature of Mind Matters News. Here are the links to all the puzzles and answers to date:

Monday Micro Softy 81: Termites are surprisingly smart. Provided we agree to count swarm intelligence, which we also use in computer science. Swarm intelligence enables the colony to converge on the shortest and most efficient path to food without any individual being especially smart.

Monday Micro Softy 80: The Digits of Least Significance. The patterns found in numbers can be useful as well as fascinating. Last week’s puzzle is also easier to solve if we observe some of the patterns that number theory reveals.

Monday Micro Softy 79: The Last Digits in Fermat’s Last Theorem. Did Andrew Wiles really prove Fermat’s Last Theorem? Today we offer you a chance to decide. About last week’s MicroSofty: Think of the probability issue as just a distraction…

Monday Micro Softy 78: Card Sharks That Bite Harder. You can beat the odds in some card games if you understand probability theory. Try your chances! Last week’s puzzle, like several others, is easy to solve if we use inclusive thinking about relationships.

Monday Micro Softy 77: Two Proud Texans  I’m aware of no other state where businesses and citizens proudly fly their state flag. I live in McGregor, Texas, where Elon Musk’s Space X has a testing center, and occasionally, the testing of their rocket engines gently rattles the dishes on the shelves in my home. 

Monday Micro Softy 76: The Smoking Gun explains a computer scientist or engineer, a law enforcement officer often relies on abductive reasoning to crack a case, so with this in mind, you will have to crack last week’s puzzle. You can find puzzles 55 through 75 here as well.

Monday Micro Softy 55: “It happens every spring.” Baseball, that is. Here’s a puzzle that takes in baseball’s summer. To solve last week’s puzzle, you don’t need to know the distance. Check the problem again for the number you do need to know. You can find puzzles 51 through 54 here as well.

Monday Micro Softy 50: Cutting through the cornbread. How did Yuri Senior cut the cornbread into eight identical portions using only three straight cuts? You can guess the answer to Microsofty 49 if you try the test question yourself at home, using a small mirror. Links to Microsofties 46 through 49 are here as well.

Image Credit: DigitalArt Max - Adobe Stock

Monday Micro Softy 45: Can Tony beat the fast-food curfew? An early curfew on fast food service motivated a boy to exercise more vigorously. But how fast was he pedalling? To solve Micro Softy 44, recall that Tony doesn’t need to take the individual pills each day, only the prescribed amount of each. You will find links here to Micros Softies 41 through 44 as well.

Monday Micro Softy 40: The fate of a false prophet. He wasn’t actually fired for being a false prophet but for something that his prophecy unintentionally revealed. The solution to Micro Softy 39 lies in considering an alternative possible meaning of a word commonly used in sports. You will also find links to Micro Softies 30 through 39 and their answers here as well.

Monday Micro Softy 29: A funeral lament in four lines. The funeral director was puzzled by Dan’s description of his relationship to the deceased but there was no question that his grief was sincere Here, you will also find links to Microsofties 22 through 29.

Monday Micro Softy 21: Finding More of the Deadly Fentanyl Pills. Here, you will also find links to Microsofties 11 through 20 as well.

Monday Micro Softy 11: What Happened to That Other Dollar? Here you will find links to the first ten Micro Softies. Have fun!