biology

The Ants

The Ants is a biology topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand The Ants rather than just read about it. In short: The Ants is a zoology textbook by the German entomologist Bert Hölldobler and the American entomologist E. O.

Key takeaways

The Ants belongs to biology; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect The Ants to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of The Ants from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The Ants is a zoology textbook by the German entomologist Bert Hölldobler and the American entomologist E. O. Wilson, first published in 1990. It won the Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction in 1991.

Contents This book is primarily aimed at academics as a reference work, detailing the ants' anatomy, physiology, social organization including their caste system, altruistic behaviour, and chemical communication with pheromones, their ecology (vital for turning the soil and controlling insect pests), and natural history. An account of some of Hölldobler and Wilson's most interesting findings, popularized for the layman, can be found in their 1994 book Journey to the Ants.

Reception The Science magazine reviewer described the book as a "mighty tome" and commented that it would "surely take its place among the greatest of all entomology books", as it was "a wonderful exploration of almost every ramification of evolutionary biology, from developmental biology to the structure of ecological communities". The illustrations are praised as lavish and extremely detailed, with monochrome drawings and 24 colour plates. All the 297 extant genera are illustrated and identifiable with the supplied keys. But "The Ants, like every great book and every ant colony, is much more than the sum of its parts." Diana Wheeler, reviewing the book in The Quarterly Review of Biology, comments that William Morton Wheeler thought his book not practical to revise as it would require too much work and would make the book too expensive, and that it was fortunate that the authors "did not flinch" at the challenge. They had produced a massive but affordable volume, and it was accessible to the public as well as to entomologists.

See also Ants: Their Structure, Development and Behavior

References

External links The Ants at Open Library Review: "The only professional science work to have won a Pulitzer Prize -- for general nonfiction in 1991 – The Ants"

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with The Ants

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what The Ants claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In biology, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to The Ants before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about The Ants ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of The Ants

In research: The Ants appears in biology research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses The Ants in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: The Ants is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1990 English-language non-fiction books, 1990 non-fiction books, Ants, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for The Ants outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study The Ants in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what The Ants means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain The Ants out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is The Ants in simple terms?

The Ants is a zoology textbook by the German entomologist Bert Hölldobler and the American entomologist E. O.

Why does The Ants matter?

Because it connects several biology ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study The Ants?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on The Ants.