There are few topics that bring fascination and headshaking as close as 'Artificial Intelligence'. Computers and robots not only completing complex tasks on their own but actually learning something new while doing so, increasing their performance and supporting each other? The simple thought of it questions the status of the pride of creation, which humans usually grant to themselves and their brains. Small wonder that many regard this research as simply useless.

When in the nineties computer scientists started to investigate new possibilities of improving the performance of their software, they started with the swarm intelligence of ants: Not being able to do something 'intelligent' as a single animal, they fulfill almost unbelievable tasks as a colony. And it is the swarm intelligence of ants and bees that today inspires brain researchers. So, was it not that useless, after all?

In "Riders on a Swarm" The Economist reports on happy ants, dancing bees and what we might learn from them about the functions of our own brains.