The emergence of a higher(?) intelligence.

From elementary school we all know that ant colonies and similar animal organizations seem capable of purposeful behavior. Although individual ants don't possess an understanding of what they're doing, when we view the colony as a whole we get the feeling that a higher intelligence is directing them. This metaphor has frequently been used to describe the World Wide Web - perhaps as individuals we're just blogging around on various topics that attract and interest us, but if we could view our activities from a more comprehensive vantage point, we might discover that there was truly method to the madness. Pooling our computing power may also be a way of accomplishing tasks that might otherwise seem impossible.

In a similar fashion, numerous attempts have been made to map out our collective tagging behaviors. Some people even claim that this might be called Visualizing the collective brain. One person who viewed this graphic remarked

It looks a bit like the inside of a brain.

But then, so does a bowl of oatmeal, and I'm not sure that many people would attempt to find much intelligence in that.

Go to: Are crowds really that smart?