
Everyone knows what ants are about. They’re no-nonsense little guys. They work all summer (holidays are for the weak) to save up for winter. They sleep when they’re dead. They soldier on, sometimes lifting up to 5,000 times their own weight, all for the good of the collective, out of instinct that can resemble duty and honor and obligation.
They don’t mess around, ants.Except, it turns out, some do—but maybe for a good reason. In 2015, biologists at the University of Arizona observed that quite a number of so-called “worker ants” spend most of their time, well, not working. “They really just sit there,” Daniel Charbonneau, a researcher at the university, said in a statement. They might chip in with chores—grooming or brood care, from time to time—but most of the time, they’re studious about doing nothing. In Temnothorax rugatulus colonies in the lab, Charbonneau found around 40 percent…
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