Insect Families and States

Updated and extended, this much sought-after publication on social insects (originally titled INSECT STATES or WHY do Wasps, Bees, Bumblebees, Ants, and Termites…, Prague: ÚOCHB Publishing 1997) by entomologist, university lecturer and science popularizer Jan Žďárek offers an engaging and accessible exploration of the mysteries and myths surrounding familial and social behaviors of insects and spiders. Drawing on the latest scientific insights, the author explores how and why, millions of years ago, certain creatures evolved into social structures of a complexity comparable – and, indeed, in many ways far superior – to that of human society. These animals live under regimes where individual selfishness is an unknown and evolutionarily outdated phenomenon, where decisions concerning the fate and governance of the community are made in the most democratic, though, from a human outsider’s point of view, the most cruel-seeming and totalitarian manner. Should we admire them, or should we fear them? Might we even see in them a prefiguration of our civilization’s distant future? The book is richly illustrated, primarily with photographs.