Obviously humans are not ants. Ants' selflessness arises from their near mindlessness--there's little there to generate a sense of self. Conversely, human selfishness arises from our far more powerful minds which are quite effective at producing a vivid sense of self. It follows that an organized complexity composed of humans cannot be integrated together in the same way as that of the ants. What does not follow is that an organized complexity of humans cannot exist sustainably.
Sustainable human complexity requires several things:
1) That we expand our consciousness to embrace all other humans and to see ourselves as existing within the Earth's ecology, upon which we are dependent. We must change ourselves fundamentally in this regard. Infant humans assume that they are the center of the universe, but growing up entails learning that this is not so. What we must do is to grow up a bit more as a species. We must not only realize that there are others, but that we must act cooperatively with these others, and with nature. Further developing our powers of observation and abstraction can help considerably to facilitate this growth as I've recently written about in my essay "Consciousness and Complexity."
2) Ant colonies are interlinked by a web of pheromones which link all of its members together in an information sharing network. Global organization of humanity requires that we do the equivalent by linking humanity together in a truly worldwide web--a global internet. This web must allow for not only information sharing, but collective decision-making. Ultimate human decision-making must occur at the global level, though each individual's input will necessarily be based upon local information available to that individual. Optimal decisions will emerge from the collective decision-making process.
3) The energy base of global society must be sustainable. I believe that a fundamentally critical component of an energy system is that it must allow for the global distribution of renewably produced power. This will make the welfare of all humans dependent upon sharing with all other humans, in addition to allowing for the most efficient usage possible of energy. I believe that the most expedient method for setting up a planetary power-sharing grid is to place wire mesh microwave reflectors into geosynchronous orbit and relay power around the world via beamed microwaves. I've recently addressed this topic in my essay entitled "Pi in the Sky."
How to make all of this happen? First, realize that today's existing worldwide system of organized complexity (the global political economy) is self-doomed. Like Rome, it will fall, and it will cease to exist. No outside force need be brought to bear to cause this result""it is the now inevitable result of human selfishness and avariciousness becoming the fundamental and unsustainable organizing principle for humanity.
What we must do is to consciously change ourselves, while networking as densely and interactively as possible with others, to create linked, interactive nodes of organized complexity around the world, and arising from our local level organization.
As the old unsustainable order collapses of its own weight of built-in self-contradictions, all those who are aware enough to seek an alternative will be drawn into our counter-complexity. The collapse of the old society, terrible and destructive as it will be, will "inflate" the new one""but only if this alternative social complexity already exists.
That is where each of us comes in""each of us must create a local level node of alternative organization. This node should be interlinked with many others.
If we do nothing, tomorrow will be a nightmare that may forever end civilization as we know it. Even if we act, and act effectively, tomorrow may still be a nightmare""though perhaps less so than would otherwise have been the case. However, the day after tomorrow, might see the full emergence of a truly humane planetary organized complexity which is humane, personally fulfilling, and above all, environmentally sustainable, for ages to come.
One organizational advantage humans could potentially possess over ants is to become a conscious planetary species. All humans everywhere would be integral members of this globally organized human complexity.
As we were admonished by Proverbs 6:6, consider the ant: it has flourished for 160,000,000 years! Let us take that as a challenge to see whether we humans, with our large brains, can do as well or even better in the eons to come.
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