Lessons we can learn from ants to change ourselves and our world | Josh Leslie | TEDxWindsor

In this TEDx talk, Josh Leslie summarizes some of the latest scientific research on ants and several of the lessons he believes it holds for those of us looking to improve ourselves and our world. How can ants show us how to tackle some of the world's most daunting problems AND inspire us to take action towards solutions? If you are getting 'antsy' about climate change or any number of social, political, economic or societal problems, but feeling powerless to do anything about them, then you'll find it worth your while to invest the time to watch this talk.

Heartfelt thanks to Dr. Chris Reid (from work completed at the New Jersey Institute of Technology) and Dr. Matthew Lutz (from work completed at Princeton University) for the Eciton army ant living bridge photo and to Prof. Ofer Feinerman (from work completed with his team and colleagues at the Weizmann Institute of Science) for the myrmecological video footage. Josh Leslie worked for over a decade in research ethics administration, a field most people have never heard of, helping oversight bodies most people don't even know about to do important work most people are unaware of, faster and better. He yearned for exponential improvements rather than incremental improvements, which is why after working for over a decade within the research side of the healthcare system in Halifax, Nova Scotia and at SickKids and UHN in Toronto, Ontario, he turned his focus to entrepreneurship in 2013. Today as a social innovator and change catalyst, he invests his time and energy in three very different businesses: the vehicles through which he believes he can bring the most value to the world. Through Stewardly, his social purpose software business, he is working to get better medicine to people who need it sooner, by reducing the time it takes to get new drugs and medical devices to the healthcare system. He serves as Chief Business Strategist for Poutination which he co-founded with Ravi Supaul, and together their joint mission is world peace through poutine: a delicious French Canadian dish turned global phenomenon; the love of which brings people of all different backgrounds and walks of life together. Lastly, through the ALLony™, an incubator for impact-driven entrepreneurs, Josh and his team help coaches, healers, intuitives and other "lightworkers" find and deeply serve the 1000 people in the world that they can each impact the most.
This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx

Six years ago, I walked away
from my six-figure dream job,

a job that I readily invested
60-70 hours a week in,

consistently over the course
of almost five years.

I had my conscious reasons
for doing so at the time,

but I also had other reasons
that I couldn't quite articulate.

Nowadays, I would say
that I had a deep knowing,

and only now do I feel in a position
where I can explain it.

But first in order to do so,

I need to tell you about a few things
I've learned in the meantime

about both ants and humans.

So as a social entrepreneur
and social innovator,

I spend a lot of time thinking
about co-opetition in the service economy.

In other words, how we can help each other
thrive more efficiently and effectively.

It's this interest that led me
to ant research

because ants work together.

And by no stretch of the imagination
am I a myrmecologist,

which is the type of scientist
that studies ants,

but I do find their research
really intriguing and valuable,

and I think that it has vast implications
for both us and our systems.

So let me drop
a few heavy ant stats on you.

So, ants have been around
for a hundred million years,

since the time of the dinosaurs.

Arguably, they are one of the most
successful species in history,

and for those of you keeping score,

dinosaurs: zero, ants: one,

so they know something about surviving.

Ants actually constitute a quarter
or more of the animal biomass

on the whole planet,

which given the fact that
they're a millionth the size of a human

is pretty amazing.

In fact, if you rewind
the clock just 250 years,

ants and humans
literally weighed the same,

they counterbalanced us on the planet.

And still today, even though
we've gotten better at procreating,

that's still largely true.

So while we're having
environmental impacts

and other sorts of things
that we might not have intended,

ants are quietly working
behind the scenes,

repairing forest floors,
that sort of thing.

Ants can lift between 50 and 200 times
their own weight

and withstand between
3,000 and 5,000 times

their own weight in pressure.

But there's three specific lessons
that I think we can look to ants for

that we can practically
apply in our own lives.

The first is working together
to overcome obstacles

and particularly obstacles
that we can't overcome on our own.

This is a picture of fire ants,
and before I go any further

anybody who knows fire ants
or may have been bitten by a fire ant

might say, "Fire ants are jerks!"

And, you know, probably you're right.

But there are 14,000 known species of ants

and many thousands more
that haven't yet been classified.

Maybe sometimes, but so are some humans,

so don't paint them all
with the same brush.

(Laughter)

And with that, I will tell you
what this is a picture of.

This is a fire ant raft

during Hurricane Harvey
in Pearland, Texas.

As you might expect,
a flood is pretty threatening for ants,

and if they don't do something,
they'll obviously drown.

So what they do is they build a raft,

and all the other fire ants
can pile on top,

and it's sustainable for between
one and three weeks.

If they tried to individually swim,

they're not going to swim
for a week or three weeks,

and so by banding together,
they can survive the flood, literally.

Here's another example
from a type of army ant.

When these ants encounter
a chasm that they can't cross,

they form a living bridge with each other,

and the rest of the ants
can walk over the bridge and back

and accomplish whatever
they were trying to do

more effectively and efficiently.

In terms of practical applications for us,

I think the problems that we feel
most powerless to solve

are the ones where this comes into play.

They are systemic, structural problems,

environmental problems,
political problems,

social problems, economic problems.

And it's only through working together

that we can actually
do something about those.

The second lesson is on leadership
and redefining our idea of leadership.

I'm just going to show you a video now
of an ant known as the longhorn crazy ant.

They are carrying this Cheerio.

Eight or nine of them are carrying
this Cheerio in a certain direction

and suddenly this one ant zips in

and they start pulling it
in a different direction.

Obviously, that ant is not as strong
as the other nine ants put together,

but they're confident and assured,
and they come in and they know something.

They start pulling
in that direction with conviction

and the other ants follow them.

This video and the following video

are from Prof. Ofer Feinerman
at the Weizmann Institute of Science

and his colleagues,

and he has a couple things to say
in particular about leadership

in the context of this video.

One is, "This leader that comes along,
she doesn't have to introduce herself,

she doesn't have to be stronger
than the rest -

she just has to pull
in the correct direction."

And "As far as we can tell,

the scout is no different
to the other ants.

No one designates the leader.

She designates herself

because she has current knowledge
about the correct direction."

I think this lesson is most applicable

to those of you who work or volunteer

in roles that wouldn't traditionally
be considered leadership positions.

My challenge for you is to think about,
is there something that you know,

a better way, a more efficient
or effective path where you can show up,

and just start leading
in the right direction

and have people follow you?

The third lesson is making sure
there's enough for everyone.

This is a video of a type of carpenter ant
and a process called ant trophallaxis.

It's fluorescent food,
so you can see where the food's going.

Two ants go, and they look for food.

What you'll see is one ant
finds pretty much all the food,

and the other ant doesn't find
very much food.

Through this process of trophallaxis
that you're seeing right here,

they share the food.

Something that you might
not know about ants

is they actually have two stomachs.

They have their own stomach,
and they have a social stomach.

The purpose of the social stomach is -

this is not really a typical example -

it would be that only certain ants
go out and get food,

and other ants are back at their colony,
raising young, taking care of operations.

So they will bring the food back
and have enough for everybody

through their social stomach.

In our context, our social stomach
is our tax system,

where we pay more, or we pay into

to provide for the needs of everyone,

not just ourselves.

And this afternoon, there's going
to be a really good talk

about universal basic income

as a potential way
to reform our tax system.

So I will leave it to Floyd
to talk to you all about that.

The next lesson is about humans

and that humans can also think
in the ways that ants do.

"Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu"

is a saying from the Xhosa
language of South Africa,

which essentially means,

"I am because you are,
and you are because we are."

In other words, no person is an island.

We define ourselves
in relation to one another

and better ourselves
through our acts of service

and how we serve one another.

There's a quote.

You may have heard this concept
under a different term,

which is "ubuntu,"
which is a lot more widely known.

Audrey Tang says

that ubuntu "implies that everyone
has different skills and strengths;

people are not isolated,

and through mutual support,

they can help each other
to complete themselves."

This is the closest human worldview

to what I like to believe ants think
and how they operate,

which is basically what an ethos means,

and how we, as humans,

could really start embodying more
of how ants work.

But in order to do that,
I think it's time for a firmware upgrade.

If you don't know what firmware is,

it's a little bit of software
that runs on a motherboard like that.

You might be most familiar with it
from your cell phone.

If you've ever updated your Android
or iOS phone, done a system update,

it allows you to do,
express, or build things

that you couldn't do before.

A most practical example
is about once a year

you do a system update
and you have new emojis.

(Laughter)

But the firmware upgrade
that's needed for us

is to do the inner work.

Our firmware -
I'll move to the next slide -

our firmware is passed down
over generations, millennia,

and there's a lot of things in there.

The firmware, just to be clear,

is the software that runs
between our ears.

A lot of the things passed down

are no longer relevant,
they're not useful.

Let's just say there are a lot
of bugs in the system -

(Laughter)

pun moderately intended.

The way that we can work on getting
those bugs out is through inner work,

and that's working on how we think,
and on our hearts,

and how we perceive the world.

I'm really encouraged

that there are thousands
of people stepping forward

to help do that work,

because much like the Cheerio,
we can't lift the heavy rocks ourselves.

And those are heavy rocks

that are revisiting basic programming
that we don't even think of

that has us operate day in and day out.

But I think, specifically,
we're in need of a "reoriANTation,"

if you'll allow me that,

to move away from something
towards something.

What to need to move away from
is the basic way of thinking of,

how can I get the most value for me,
or for me and mine right now,

and move towards?

How can I add the most value
for all of us right now?

So with that said,
I can now tell you in a better way

why I walked away
from my six-figure dream job

six years ago.

Essentially, I realized
I had this deep knowing

that while what I was doing was valuable,

and I was working extremely hard at it,
I wasn't showing up as my whole self.

I wasn't showing up with all the value
I could bring to the world.

And this is a question that I have
really unpacked over the last six years,

which has seen me start and found
not one, not two,

but three very different businesses.

The best way I could explain that

is that one represents the most value
I can bring to the world

with the left side of my brain;

one is the most value I can bring
with the right side of my brain;

and one is the most value
I can bring with my heart.

And a lot of people don't understand that,

and I'm not necessarily
looking for them to.

I'm not looking
for their permission or approval.

I know that what I'm doing is valuable,

and much like the ant with the Cheerio,

I'm just pulling with all my focus
and energy in that direction,

or in those directions.

My question for you is,
what are you leaving on the table?

What parts of yourself
are you not bringing to the world?

How can you add the most value
for all of us right now?

This is basically doing more
than you need to do.

So, rather than working
your nine to five job,

and then playing Candy Crush,
or binge-watching Netflix,

or scrolling social media for five hours,

or if you're like me,
maybe more than one of those things,

take some of that time

and devote it to creating value for others

instead of simply consuming the value
that other people have created.

There's a saying which is,

how we spend our days
is how we spend our lives.

And just for some context,

assuming that you've got about
16 hours a day to use

and that you sleep sometimes,

if you spend an hour a day
on social media for a year,

that's three weeks of your year.

Two hours is one and a half months.

The one thing we can't get is more time.

So I hope that that inspires you to take
at least 5 minutes or 15 minutes

of one of those hours

and contribute it
to what I'm talking about.

So there's one other person
who's talked about "ubuntu,"

and his name's Nelson Mandela -
you might have heard of him.

And he says, "Ubuntu does not mean
that people should not enrich themselves.

The question therefore is,

are you going to do so in order
to enable the community around you

and to enable it to improve?"

I like to believe that he meant
enrich in the broadest sense:

physically, mentally,
spiritually, financially.

But there's something missing:

a way to make this practical

and an easy way to remember
in our daily lives

because ubuntu is not necessarily
a concept that floats around here.

So bear with me, I'm going
to go off for a second,

but I promise I'll connect
the dots in a few slides.

The word that came to mind
for me is "ante,"

and for anybody that plays poker,
it comes from there

where each round of the card game,
everybody has to pay a certain amount.

I think we need
a new definition of "ante,"

which rather than a small amount of money
from every player that goes into the pot,

a small amount of value from every human

that has contributed to the world.

Another phrase is "ante up,"
which means to do one's part,

and that's really what I want
to leave you with

is to think of what it is to do your part.

To me, that's choosing to do more
than you absolutely need to do.

So, in other words,
start doing what you know has value

on top of what the world
tells you has value,

even if other people
don't necessarily appreciate it yet.

And a fair question that you might ask is,

"Well, how do I know what that is?"

What I would say is I believe everybody
has the same deep knowing

and that if you quiet your mind
and sit with yourself,

there's something inside you,
a small voice that you can listen to

that will tell you what that is.

And if you don't hear it,
listen even more intently.

As a hint, if there's something
that you always wished that you could do,

or known you could do but aren't doing,

go and do some of that.

Just quickly, as a mental hook here,

I was thinking about ants and energy,

and Einstein had E = MC2 for energy,

so I think of "ante" as "ant energy."

And it's not enough
just to believe in what I'm saying,

but also Gandhi said, "Be the change
you want to see in the world."

To me, that is about embodying this.

How do you embody ant energy?

And so, we face some
pretty significant problems today,

ones that are seemingly intractable

and I believe need us to bring
our full selves to the table.

The "ante" is already being upped
in the poker chips kind of game.

The world is getting more complex,
and the problems are getting more complex.

I think it's time for us to up
the ant energy to match that.

And so the question
I'm leaving you with is,

how are you going to "ante" up?