GO WITH YOUR GUT INSTINCT
Many behaviours that appear to require brain power could be based on simple gut feelings, according to new research.
Take a bumblebee’s decision on whether to forage nearby or seek richer pickings further afield. After visiting two empty flowers consecutively it looks elsewhere, which has been interpreted as evidence of rudimentary mathematical abilities. But work led by Andrew Higginson of the University of Exeter suggests that, theoretically, it could be based on simpler rules of thumb.
“The body itself is a store of information about the past,” Higginson says. “A bee might simply assess whether there is any nectar in the tube between its mouth and its stomach.”
Similarly, Higginson speculates that the rate at which adrenalin leaves the system after a fright could determine how long a rabbit hides in its burrow after being chased by a fox, without having to calculate how long the fox is likely to wait.
“These basic bodily states contain a lot of useful, complex information,” says Higginson.