Democracy Chronicles came across this interesting post from ZME Science, Alexandru Micu. Here is an excerpt: 

Some animals out there really do surprise us with their smarts. Sheep, in general, are not one of those animals for most people. But whatever these wooly critters may lack in apparent individual intelligence, they make up for in groups, new research shows. According to the findings, the collective behavior of sheep in a flock follows a self-organizing principle, with individuals continuously adapting their direction and speed in such a way as to give rise to a “collective” motion.

The animals alternate between leading the flock and following another leader, the authors explain, in an organic and highly fluid manner. Such processes represent an example of collective intelligence that can teach us more about how self-organizing systems can share information among their individual parts, giving us insight into how to recreate such systems in the future.

“In most gregarious animal systems, collective motion is not a continuous process, but occurs in episodes: collective motion phases are interrupted, for instance, to rest or feed,” said Fernando Peruani, corresponding author of the paper, for Phys.org. “Nevertheless, most collective motion studies, including experimental and theoretical ones, consider groups that remain, from the beginning till the end, on the move. Furthermore, it is often assumed that flocking behavior requires individuals to continuously negotiate on the direction of travel.”

Read full article here.