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Cockroaches Make Group Decisions?
The Discovery Channel is reporting a recent study indicates that cockroaches govern themselves using simple group consultations before anything that affects the entire group. From the article: " The research determined that cockroach decision-making follows a predictable pattern that could explain group dynamics of other insects and animals, such as ants, spiders, fish and even cows. Cockroaches, Blattella Germanica, are silent creatures, save perhaps for the sound of them scurrying over a counter top. They therefore must communicate without vocalizing.
What happens when you divide your shoebox into three sections? Do the molecules in the air divide themselves evenly between two of the sections, but leave the third empty? I think you missed a few details from the article. I don't think this is incredibly revolutionary, but it is still interesting. The roaches seem to attempt to maintain large but evenly sized groups. Instead of the bugs all distributing evenly among the shelters or squeezing as many as would fit into one shelter then all the rest into the second, they struck a balance between group size and eveness.
Of course the article was rather lacking in details. Was it always 25, or was it sometimes a 27/23 split?
"-1 Troll" is the apparently the same as "-1 I disagree with you."