‘swarm intelligence’
By Pam Linn
It occurs to me that we Americans have absolutely no business laying a guilt trip on the Iraqi Parliament for taking the month of August off. Our own senators and representatives are splitting for a few weeks of R&R, leaving much work undone. Summer temperatures in Iraq hover around 120 degrees. In Washington, where electricity permits AC units to whir day and night, temperatures likely will not exceed 100.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she is proud of what they have accomplished. Some of it, like the energy bill, looks good so far but will molder awaiting reconciliation with the Senate version (passed in June) after the recess. They are poles apart on some issues.
The House bill would remove several of the oil industry’s beloved tax breaks and subsidies (to the tune of $16 billion over 10 years), the Senate will likely oppose this vigorously. The Senate (to its credit) increases fuel economy standards by 40 percent to 35 mpg by 2020 (not addressed in House bill). Ignoring fuel economy, the House would provide tax breaks and subsidies for better batteries for plug-in hybrid cars and a $4,000 tax credit for those who purchase them. Both House and Senate are pushing incentives for biomass factories and research into biodiesel and cellulosic ethanol. Will a summer recess freshen the lawmakers’ negotiation skills? Let’s hope.
And in balmy California, a budget standoff has brought Gov. Schwarzenegger’s government nearly to a halt. With its reserves depleted, the state is unable to pay $1.1 billion that was due in July. The debt will grow in August by another $2.1 billion. But legislators are on holiday for several weeks even though healthcare clinics that depend on Medi-Cal payments are facing bankruptcy. Would benchmarks help?
Meanwhile, it appears that presidential candidates (several dozen at last count) will continue their “debates” through the dog days of summer, giving the news media more than enough fodder for trivial discussion. Cleavage was the inane subject of discourse among talking heads last week. Was Hillary’s display over the top? Were the young wives of John McCain and Fred Thompson showing more skin than what is considered appropriate for a first lady? And is the disparity in age of presidential couples an asset or a detriment? Or was the Rudi and Judy tell- or show-all in the March issue of Harper’s Bazaar way too steamy? Puhleeze.
Aside from an intriguing and scary story in the Los Angeles Times Friday on the prevalence of bisphenol A (BPA), an estrogen-like compound in plastic and hence in humans, and a follow-up on Mattel toys made in China contaminated with lead, local media was focused on the aforementioned non-news.
So, for the rest of August at least, I’m reading books: “Deep Energy” by Bill McKibben, “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle” by Barbara Kingsolver and “Omnivore’s Dilemma” by Michael Pollan.
Also, the July issue of National Geographic has, along with the breathtaking photos for which they’re famous, articles on news that really matters. In “Bedlam in the Blood: Malaria,” Michael Finkel explains why nearly half a billion people get malaria every year and more than a million of them die. Why the development of a vaccine is so difficult: the culprit is a one-celled parasite called plasmodia carried in the saliva of the female Anopheles mosquito. After the bite, the parasites ride the blood stream directly to the liver where they burrow into a cell. A single plasmodia is enough to kill a person. Cures and vaccines for viral and bacterial diseases are a cakewalk compared to these parasites described by experts as “a genius. It’s smarter than we are.”
In “The Genius of Swarms” of the same issue, Peter Miller describes how ants, honeybees, even many fish and birds foil predators, find food and establish shelter by working together. “Ants aren’t clever . . . at least not as individuals.” A colony of ants, however, can solve problems unthinkable for individual ants. They use “swarm intelligence.” Most swarms do not have a leader organizing things, ordering others about. Yet, a flock of starlings moves as one to evade attack by a peregrine falcon; a school of small fish uses the same technique to foil a shark. The simple rules: stick together, avoid collisions and swim in the same direction.
“The ability of these swarms or groups to shift shape as one, even when they have no leader, reflects the genius of collective behavior-something scientists are now tapping to solve human problems.”
With any luck at all, they may impart this to our legislators. But not until after the summer recess.