Natures wonders:Dragon fly hunting (Introduction)

by dhw, Thursday, January 10, 2013, 20:03 (4333 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: These insects which go back 325 million years can hone in on prey with accuracy 95% of the time. A tiny brain that works:-http://www.adelaide.edu.au/news/news58341.html-
Actually, they say 97% accuracy. Thank you for this and for the many other fascinating posts under the same heading.-QUOTES: "What's exciting for us is that this is the first direct demonstration of something akin to selective attention in humans shown at the single neuron level in an invertebrate," Associate Professor O'Carroll says.-"Recent studies reveal similar mechanisms at work in the primate brain, but you might expect it there. We weren't expecting to find something so sophisticated in lowly insects from a group that's been around for 325 million years."-People are constantly surprised at the sophisticated level of intelligence demonstrated by insects, birds and animals. Even when they are shown to have the ability to solve problems, to communicate complex information, to feel and display emotions, to behave altruistically, to form highly efficient social groups ... still we fail to recognize that all these abilities within ourselves have been inherited from our fellow creatures. The smaller they are, the less we can identify with them because they seem so unlike us, but I suspect that the more scientists study them, the more "sophistication" they will discover.