Fungus takes over ants
Comment on Carl?
CEbbinghaus@lemmy.world 7 months agoTrust me. You don’t want to know. It’s fucked up parasite shit. On the same level as the fungus that takes over ants.
sabreW4K3@lazysoci.al 7 months ago
notabot@lemm.ee 7 months ago
That’ll be Ophiocordyceps unilateralis. It invades the ant’s brain and causes it to leave it’s nest and go somewhere better for the fungus then wait to die as the fungus errupts from its head.
If we’re talking about nightmare mind control horrors, we shouldn’t forget our old friend toxiplasmosis gondii, which infects rodents, then alters their behaviour so they’re not afraid of cats, in particular. This leads to the rodent getting eaten so the parasite can infect the cat, which is the only place it can reproduce, before spreading from the cat faeces back into the rodent population. It can also infect humans where there is evidence that it affects behavior too, particularly making males more careless of rules.
Sleep well.
brbposting@sh.itjust.works 7 months ago
That’s why momma always reminded us:
Be kind, they may harbor a latent Toxoplasma gondii infection that could subtly influence their behavior and personality.
sabreW4K3@lazysoci.al 7 months ago
I hate you now!
notabot@lemm.ee 7 months ago
Oh come now, there are so many more interesting parasites that mess with your brain for their own benefit; Trypanosoma which messes with your sleep before slowly killing you, Naegleria fowleri that just straight up eats your brain and a host of others that do weird and wonderful things.
Look at it this way; before you were surrounded by mind controlled ants, suicidal rodents and other such horrors without even knowing it. Now you do know about them. What’s that? I’m really not helping? Ok, I’ll stop.
Wutchilli@feddit.de 7 months ago
And those little things might make you kinky. journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/…/1474704916659746 (One of my favorit papers because a friend of mine got them)
merari42@lemmy.world 7 months ago
This is a good place to leave this link to a nice folk song about parasites
Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de 7 months ago
so that’s why guys who like cats are generally friendly anarchists
HawlSera@lemm.ee 7 months ago
Wait they can effect humans now?!?! And they’re capable of understanding rules enough to get us to actively break them!?!?!?
notabot@lemm.ee 7 months ago
I don’t think they understand ‘rules’, rather they mess with the brain structures that control self regulation. It’s believed that around 30-50% of the human population may have a /T. Gondii/ infection, with a corresponding link to other diseases. High levels may also go some way to explaining the prevalence of high risk behaviors in certain areas, although proving a correlation is challenging due to confounding factors.
samus12345@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Real-life ant clickers.
Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de 7 months ago
based parasite makes dudes anarchists
gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works 7 months ago
It’s a thing that exists in real life that was essentially used as the base premise (but for humans) in The Last Of Us.
pewgar_seemsimandroid@lemmy.blahaj.zone 7 months ago
image your best friend becomes a zombie…
lowleveldata@programming.dev 7 months ago
Like Shaun of the Dead? That wasn’t too bad
pewgar_seemsimandroid@lemmy.blahaj.zone 7 months ago
???
Remotedeck@discuss.tchncs.de 7 months ago
Your right, I looked it up and I wish I didn’t
atro_city@fedia.io 7 months ago
His right or your right?
Ghyste@sh.itjust.works 7 months ago
Yes.