The Myth Of The Ant King Analysis

Many believe that interactions produce knowledge. This is seen in Cathy Davidson’s “Project Classroom Makeover” and in Steven Johnson’s “The Myth of the Ant Queen.” Davidson discusses the importance of working collaboratively. Johnson explores different systems and the interactions within them. The system is made of many individuals that need to communicate to solve certain problems. Both authors discuss the hierarchies and how it limits individuals from collectively working together. Without a hierarchy, interactions between individuals allow for them to learn.
The two authors present individuals working together. Davidson shows this with the iPod experiments that use crowdsourcing. Davidson explains how “crowdsourcing means inviting a group
Davidson suggests that the common goal her student’s have is to fight against hierarchy and standard education. Davidson clearly believes that standardized education does not enrich students in a “world of social networking, crowdsourcing, customizing, and user-generated content” (Davidson 55). Her students are fighting towards a different learning mechanism that is not forced upon their throats by teachers. That is why students get to learn collectively if they “[convince] a prof to require [an iPod] for a course and come up with a learning app in the course” (Davidson 51). Individuals had to be unified so people other than the freshmen can receive an iPod therefore breaking away from the standardized school system. Students are working collectively so that they can fight against the “formal education [that] typically teaches hierarchies of what’s worth paying attention to” (Davidson 51). Davidson’s students are using the iPod as a mechanism to create learning applications that allow for individuals to overcome hierarchies. Johnson’s example of the ants resembles individuals fighting for a common goal without a hierarchy. Although, the students at Duke and the ants are opposites because one has a hierarchy and the other does not; the ants are working together for a common goal. The ants are proven to show that they have created a unique system in the absence of hierarchy because they have a common set of goals. As Gordon clear points out “the queen is not an authority figure. It would be physically impossible for the queen to direct every worker's decision about which task to perform and when” (Johnson 194). These ants do not have an authority figure but they still have a common goal of keeping their queen safe. These ants work collectively to ensure that their queen is safe thereby ensuring the life of their species. Johnson also shows the impact of hierarchy in