• 3 Posts
  • 12 Comments
Joined 1 year ago
cake
Cake day: July 13th, 2023

help-circle




  • Yeah I prefer 6 over 5 any day, but there are a few small things that 5 does do better imo. I do prefer the more serious art style of 5, and I noticed that there is a lot less actual dialogue in a civs respective language compared to 5. While I do like automatic road creation, I do also miss being able to build it manually to have more control over where units can go. Finally, I think the happiness system in Civ 6 is a bit too easy, as it can be mostly ignored and very easily fixed compared to 5. Keeping your citizens happy was much more of a challenge there.










  • Let me put your mind at ease. The zombie ant phenomenon is nothing to be scared of as a human.

    In nature, there are many pathogens/parasites. Some of them are able to manipulate their hosts to their own benefit. The zombie ants are not actual zombies, rather they are still alive ants that are manipulated before their death. This disease is caused by fungi of the Ophiocordyceps family. These fungi infect the ants and change their behaviour over the course of roughly one month. First, the ants social behaviour is surpressed and their biological clock disrupted. Then they start wildly walking around in nonsensical patterns. Eventually, when the infection has reached its peak, the ant climbs up some vegetation (grass, reeds, bushes, etc.). Here, it bites and clamps onto this vegetation, and that is that for the ant. It dies in this position. After a few days, a fruiting body (somewhat akin to a mushroom) sprouts from the body to release spores. If the spores manage to infect an ant, the cycle repeats.

    Ophiocordyceps is not the only manipulator in nature. The Massospora fungi hijack cicadas and replace their genitals. Then, they induce mating behaviour. When another cicada tries to mate, they get infected instead. And there are many others like them. The way they manipulate their host is different between all of them, but they do have one thing in common: they are all highly specialized. For example, the Ophiocordyceps fungi species generally are only able to infect one ant species. They have co-evolved in an arms race over millions of years, where the ant develops mechanisms to defend themselves from pathogens and the pathogen develops ways around it. The chance of these highly specialized fungi to suddenly work on humans is zero. The same goes for Massospora. So, no need to worry about being forced to climb a tree or grow a fungal penis or vagina (or fungussy, if you will).

    While these pathogens are no harm to us, there are, of course, pathogens that do manipulate humans. The most infamous example is the rabies virus. Luckily, there is a vaccine against it.

    So, in short, no need to panic. Not about this, at least.