Swarm Intelligence: An Interview with Eric Bonabeau. On his learning how ants use pheromones: "Listening to this story was an epiphany, not only because I finally understood how ants were able to so efficiently raid my sandwich during these distressing picnics of my childhood, but also because I saw a powerful computing metaphor. Indeed, by discovering the shortest path to a food source, the ants collectively solve an optimization problem using emergent computation" [via cityofsound]. Nothing revolutionary, but good origin story. See also: How swarm intelligence helped Air Liquide.
Swarm Intelligence: An Interview with Eric Bonabeau. On his learning how ants use pheromones: "Listening to this story was an epiphany, not only because I finally understood how ants were able to so efficiently raid my sandwich during these distressing picnics of my childhood, but also because I saw a powerful computing metaphor. Indeed, by discovering the shortest path to a food source, the ants collectively solve an optimization problem using emergent computation" [via cityofsound]. Nothing revolutionary, but good origin story. See also: How swarm intelligence helped Air Liquide.