To understand how leaderless swarms can quickly make choices, scientists often turn to computer models of ant behavior. Mathematical biologist Dr. Iain Couzin built simulated ants that were programmed with a few 'rules' — for example, follow a pheromone trail while putting down your own, bring food back to the nest when you find it, and don’t run into anybody else. The simulated ants were able to model army ant behavior almost flawlessly. Ants as a collective are able to solve much more complex problems than any single ant could, simply because they have a way to rapidly share information with one another through signals like pheromones.

Humans can demonstrate this so-called swarm intelligence as well, even if we don't know it. In a series of experiments conducted by Dr. Couzin and researchers at the University of Leeds, human participants were given their own ‘rules’ on slips of paper that they weren’t allowed to show anybody else. The simplest experiments had rules for individuals to stay with the group, resulting in a huddle. But when researchers added directions to a few of the people to move towards objects on one side of the room or the other, you might think that the swarm would split apart. Instead, without discussing it, the group moved in the direction that the majority of those with extra directions wanted to move in.

Obviously, not every group interaction in animals and humans results in swarm intelligence. The results of online polls, for example, tend to show a snowballing or herding effect, where individuals vote in similar ways as those before them, regardless of how right they were. True swarm intelligence occurs when the group makes a rapid decision in real time as a collective. As a means of testing this, programmers at Unanimous A.I. created a program called UNUM which uses software to mimic the conditions of a real swarm. Human users each have a virtual “magnet” used to push around a puck towards one of several answers. Because no single user can control the puck by themselves, the group has to work together to pick an answer. In these conditions, the participants were able to answer predictive questions such as “Which movie will win the Oscar for Best Picture this year?” with greater accuracy than when they were polled separately.

As a species, most—perhaps all—of humanity's great successes comes from our ability to share information with one another. Right now, you are reading this article on a computer or mobile device that was the product of hundreds of inventors who piggybacked their ideas on one another, from the person who invented the LCD screen to the one who first harnessed electricity. A hive mind isn’t so scary if you think of it that way. Rather than suppressing the individual à la the Borg, the different individuals with diverse knowledge that comprise the hive are what make it so powerful.

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